Bill C-14 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption)

This enactment amends the Citizenship Act to reduce the distinctions in eligibility for citizenship between adopted foreign children and children born abroad of Canadian parents.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Is it fair to say that this legislation and this amendment, as is, right now, would close some of those unforeseen consequences from Bill C-14 back in 2007?

[Nicole Girard]

Before Bill C-14 came into effect, a Canadian parent of an international adoptee needed to sponsor that international adoptee through the immigration route and then apply for a grant of citizenship. What Bill C-14 did was that it removed that requirement to go through the immigration sponsorship route and opened up instead access to a direct grant of citizenship for an international adoptee, thereby minimizing the distinction with the first-generation child born abroad to a Canadian.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I want to correct myself. I said that this letter was from Denise Mildner. Denise Mildner was the person the letter writer was connecting with. The actual letter writer is Marlyn Wall, the executive director of Child and Youth Permanency Council of Canada. I want to give appropriate credit to the person who wrote this. I do read these. If anybody's wondering, I do read all of it.

In here, there is mention of what they consider the easiest solution, which is the elimination of the reference to paragraphs 3(1)(c.1) and 3(3)(a). Then they make a reference to another piece of legislation that I'm unfamiliar with, because a C-14 can happen in every Parliament. It says, “There is already Bill C-14 that is specifically for Internationally adopted children for direct grant of citizenship and this should preclude them from being lumped in with other forms of immigration”.

Can you explain to us Bill C-14 and which Parliament this might have been in, or is she in error?

[Nicole Girard]

From the perspective of the department, international adoptees, since Bill C-14's opening up of the direct grant of citizenship to international adoptees, are considered equal to children born abroad to a Canadian who are Canadians from birth, because those distinctions, any distinctions, are minimized to the extent possible.

As previously discussed, the benefit of this amendment, once again, is that it will extend an avenue out for international adoptees in the second generation and beyond. That may allay some of the concerns that the member is sharing on the part of the letter writer.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I have a letter here, and I think all committee members had this sent to them. As we've been doing these hearings—and they've taken a few meetings—members of the public have sent us information. Some of it is very helpful because it comes from Immigration Canada, so it has some content information.

This one is from the executive director, Denise Mildner, who is from Saskatchewan, the Evermore Centre. It provides data on the back end. I want to read it into the record and make reference to it, because it feeds into my next question. It says:

The voices of many parents have gone unheard. Since 2010, 13,791 children were born abroad and adopted by Canadian parents since bills C-14...and C-37...were passed.

That's going as far back as 2007.

Of these, 63% or 8,632 children were adopted through the Citizenship Stream. Unknowingly, by choosing this route, however, these children do not have the same rights as other Canadians and cannot pass on their citizenship. Regardless of which route was chosen, there should not exist any discriminatory laws against an internationally adopted child.

Does this amendment fix this particular situation, or does it address a different issue of just passing it on and the treatment of the children as Canadian children for the first-generation limit?

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

I would appreciate that. Bill C-14 essentially makes it easier to acquire citizenship, but it is Bill C-35 that allows us to give our children our citizenship.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

At the risk of having you repeat what you said, I want to check some information. There is the regular immigration process and there is the direct route to citizenship. Bill C-14 facilitated the direct route to citizenship for parents who adopt a child. Is that correct?

I am going back to some of the testimony we heard from parents who were very happy with Bill C-14 in the end and are not opting for the direct route to citizenship.

What is the benefit of going through the regular immigration process? Is this the additional option that they have and that you referred to earlier?

[Nicole Girard]

In fact, the current act gives equal treatment to children born abroad to Canadian parents and children who are adopted abroad by Canadians and acquire citizenship directly. As well, children born in Canada to Canadians and children who are born abroad to Canadian citizens and naturalized are treated equally with regard to transmission of citizenship.

This is as a result of two fairly recent changes to the Citizenship Act. In 2007, Bill C-14 gave parents who adopt children abroad direct access to citizenship. Previously, there was a two-step process. Parents first had to sponsor a child for him to obtain permanent residence in Canada and then apply for citizenship. In response to calls from parents for faster, more direct access to citizenship, the law was changed to allow parents to apply for citizenship directly, without having to go through the permanent residence stage. When the law changed for the second time more recently, on April 17, 2009, the changes imposed a first-generation limit on children born or adopted abroad, once again to minimize the difference in treatment between children born abroad to Canadians and children adopted abroad by Canadians who access citizenship through the direct route.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Putting aside those born abroad, the 800.... The only way to change that is really by changing the law. Is there any way that we could amend Bill C-14or the Citizenship Act? It really wouldn't have anything to do with whether the second-generation cut-off would change, right? Is there any way that we could get around this problem through the adoption law?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

About 80 parents in Canada chose the citizenship route, so their kids will have the second-generation cut-off. It's almost like cancelling Bill C-14, because Bill C-14 gave the parents a choice to bring their kids in as citizens rather than as landed immigrants, and that was because of a whole ten years of campaigning.

Am I correct that when we put in Bill C-14, it was fast-tracked here because the Canadian parents were saying that by coming as citizens you would have immediate health care, whereas for permanent residents it's three months before you can have health care? Am I correct?

I think the benefit is to arrive as a Canadian citizen. Maybe you can name some of those benefits.

[Nicole Girard]

The explanation goes back to the amendments to the law that I described. These amendments were made in response to criticism from adoptive parents. Before the law was first amended in 2007, some parents were critical of the fact that they had to go through the immigration process and then the citizenship process. With Bill C-14, the comparable groups were children born abroad to Canadian parents and children adopted abroad. With the subsequent changes to the law, including the first-generation limit, the two groups were treated the same way. We continue to minimize the difference between these two groups of people born abroad. Moreover, I think that before the 2007 changes, the court had ruled that the two groups were comparable.

[Elspeth Ross]

The problem with Bill C-14 is that it was supposed to make it equitable and faster to come home with your adopted child from another country and have the citizenship automatically. Some people are choosing not to go that route, and there are two reasons. One is that there's a possibility of not getting through. People stall in other countries for a long time in not being able to get the automatic citizenship. So some people would choose to adopt by the old way and go the permanent residency route instead. Some people are advising that people should go that way instead.

The second reason is that the automatic citizenship means that for internationally adopted children, if they live outside the country as adults and have children, their children won't be able to be Canadian citizens. This was something that totally caught everybody off guard when it happened. It was completely another issue and was entirely caught up in a different problem, and adopted children got caught in it. Our joy over Bill C-14 turned to dismay, although we were extremely happy over the deportation provision that it brought in so that criminality couldn't be a reason for sending them away afterwards.

[Wesley Moore]

First, regarding Bill C-14, as I alluded to in my opening remarks, there is an issue with it. We went through the Bill C-14 route when we adopted our son from South Africa last year. It was a wonderful experience, in that we came home with a Canadian passport. We came home with the shiny white temporary passport, and we appreciated that route.

The ability for him to carry on citizenship is an issue that came with that bill. As I alluded to, we have a biological son who is now almost four months old, and we have an adopted son who is three years old. If our biological son were outside of the country he could pass on citizenship, and that's great. If our adopted son, who is from South Africa, were outside the country, he could not pass on citizenship to his children. That is a substantive issue. The legal standing in Canada is different, and it should be remedied.

I may be unique in the fact that I did not experience a need for a substantive amount of post-adoption support. I know there are a lot of issues that come with adoption, especially of older children. I know you've heard a lot of stories. What I find to be a bigger issue with adoption, frankly, when you go internationally, is the upfront costs. International adoptions cost about, as I said, $20,000 to $50,000. For instance, to adopt from South Africa we had to spend almost a month in South Africa. It was a wonderful place to spend a month, but it was a month abroad. If you adopt from Russia, you have to fly there two or three times in the adoption process. That's expensive. To adopt internationally is cost-prohibitive.

As I said, there are 30,000 children, so it depends on what your calling is and on whether you feel you're called to adopt domestically or called to adopt internationally. That's a personal and individual choice.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you for coming and welcome.

I am going to try to summarize the main needs. We've heard other witnesses before you. Am I wrong to say that your main challenges are especially post-adoption? Perhaps you disagree. We will come back to this and you can answer then.

I understood that you don't have support groups and that you need to network. You would like adoptive parents to get the same employment insurance benefits as biological parents.

I am speaking to those who have received the benefits: is a 55% benefit rate sufficient? I know that, in Quebec, the benefits go up to 70% of insurable earnings. There is even a maximum insurable salary of $62,500. At the federal level, the maximum salary is around $43,000. Could you also tell me whether this benefit rate was sufficient for you or if you needed more? That's probably the case.

My other question is for Ms. Ross. You talked about Bill C-14, which is meant to speed up the adoption and citizenship process. From listening to you, I get the impression that it has not quite been meeting its objective. I would have liked to hear you talk more about the bill.

Mr. Moore, I am listening to what you have to say about the main needs.

[Elspeth Ross]

Three minutes is enough.

I have the same recommendations as the Adoption Council of Canada because of the lack of information: stats, publishing, and what not. But I have some new recommendations for you.

One is that the government support or preferably adopt Bill C-569 of MP John Rafferty, calling for a national strategy for FASD to commit the government to develop a national plan for treatment and prevention, which we don't have at the moment.

On citizenship, Bill C-14, from 2007, an act to amend the Citizenship Act, was applauded for bringing equality to adopted children. It did the opposite. Lawyers from the Canadian Bar Association recommended that adoptive parents use the permanent residency route instead of the direct citizenship route because the new faster route has no appeal. Now adoption advocates are recommending the permanent residency route again because the other creates a two-tier system. Now I have the same recommendation that the Adoption Council of Canada had: to amend the regulations accompanying Bill C-37 so internationally adopted children have the same legal status as children born in Canada and are permitted to transmit their citizenship by descent to children born abroad.

One thing that Bill C-14 did right was to ensure that adopted children can no longer be deported for criminality if their parents did not obtain their citizenship. Before the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration in June 2006, an official from CIC said "...to respond to charter concerns, all adopted persons would no longer be prevented from acquiring citizenship for any criminality...”. She said it was an equity matter.

In June 2008, the first of a number of adoptees who were under threat of deportation received their Canadian citizenship. A few of us protected Gilberto Currie, adopted from Brazil. We protected him for five years and kept him from being deported to Brazil until the bill was passed. We do not know how many adoptees could have been in the same position.

The fact that people are still choosing to adopt internationally by the permanent residency route leaves the possibility that parents may not obtain citizenship for their children, which can create great hardships if the adoption fails. Children who come to Canada to be adopted and whose adoptions break down before they obtain citizenship are still under threat of deportation today. This must be stopped. Canada must not bring children here in inter-country adoption only to send them back to a country they have not seen since childhood, where they know no one and do not speak the language.

Mario Perez came to Canada from Mexico to be adopted at the age of five and was deported to Mexico in 2006 at the age of 22. Efforts to prevent this failed, and he still wants to come back. We are now supporting Tina Desrosiers, who came to Canada—

Citizenship Act

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Madam Speaker, I rise to address Bill C-467 which was brought forward by the hon. member for Vancouver South.

As all members of the House are aware, this private member's bill stems from the passage in the 39th Parliament of Bill C-37, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act. Bill C-467 calls upon the government to treat children born or adopted overseas by Crown servants, including Canadian Forces personnel, as children born in Canada, such that they would be able to pass citizenship on to any children they may have or adopt outside of Canada.

The government supports the intention of Bill C-467, although we are concerned about some unintended consequences. Our success as a country is no accident but a result of an abiding belief in values such as liberty, human dignity and freedom of conscience and where harmony is the rule rather than the exception. We are an open and tolerant society, renowned for our respects for democracy and for the freedoms that come with that. We celebrate our different cultural traditions but not at the expense of sharing common Canadian ones.

That is fundamental. We need to preserve the value of Canadian citizenship along with an abiding connection to our past and to one another, where citizenship means more than access to a convenient passport.

Within the past three years, the government has passed significant laws that would correct flaws in citizenship legislation. Bill C-14 and Bill C-37 reflect clear and bold reaffirmations of our values and the principles that define us as a country.

Under the old rules, it was possible for Canadians to pass on their citizenship to endless generations born outside of Canada. To protect the value of Canadian citizenship for the future, the new law under Bill C-37 put a limit on citizenship by descent to one generation born outside of Canada, similar to the rules in other countries like the United Kingdom and New Zealand.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to address Bill C-467, brought forward by the hon. member for Vancouver South.

This private member's bill stems from the passage, in the 39th Parliament, of Bill C-37, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act. Bill C-467 calls on the government to treat children born to or adopted overseas by Crown servants, including Canadian Forces personnel and federal and provincial public servants, as children born in Canada such that they would be able to pass citizenship on to any children they may have or adopt outside Canada.

First of all, I would like to commend the member for Vancouver South for his commitment to this issue, and I would like all hon. members to know that the government supports the intention of Bill C-467. However, we have some technical concerns with the bill in its current form, as it does not achieve its intended objective and would have, as the member points out, some unintended consequences.

Nevertheless, I am confident that we can address these concerns together, with the co-operation of our parliamentary colleagues. The bill will have a positive impact on the children of Crown servants and our military serving abroad.

I would like to share with my hon. colleagues a very brief overview of Bill C-37 and the reasons that led us, as a government, to restore citizenship to lost Canadians and to include a clear limit on citizenship by descent.

Members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration will recall many witnesses who testified three years ago this spring as they shared their love for this country as proud citizens. They shared their dismay and their frustration when they described how it felt to discover that their citizenship was not, in fact, recognized by the law.

The public outcry was enormous, and that is why the government corrected the legislation. When Bill C-37 came into effect a year ago, it restored or gave citizenship to most people who were known as lost Canadians. Changes to the law restored or granted citizenship to the vast majority of those who lost or did not have it due to outdated provisions in previous legislation.

The changes meant that people who became citizens when the first Citizenship Act came into force in 1947, and people born or naturalized in Canada after 1947 and subsequently lost their citizenship, would reacquire their citizenship unless they formally renounced it or had it revoked because of fraud. Foreign-born persons adopted by Canadians between January 1, 1947 and February 15, 1977 would also be eligible to apply for citizenship. Complex rules that required some citizens by descent to take steps to apply to keep their citizenship were simply eliminated.

The new law also set a limit on citizenship by descent to the first generation born abroad. That was done to uphold the value of Canadian citizenship by requiring a real and concrete connection to Canada.

Hon. members will also recall debate of Bill C-14 in 2007 and the steps Canadians adopting foreign-born children had to take before their children could become Canadian citizens.

International adoption is a complex process, as we all know, involving many layers of approval by both provincial and territorial governments in Canada and by the federal government of the country where the child lives. In many cases, adoptions must meet the requirements of the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption.

With the passage of Bill C-14, parents of foreign-born adopted children were able to apply directly for citizenship for those children without first having to go through the steps of applying for permanent resident status. It was a clear and bold reaffirmation of the values and principles that define our identity, our country, and the notion of the Canadian family.

The goal of fixing imperfect legislation with the passage of Bill C-37 and Bill C-14 was essentially to simplify the complex rules on Canadian citizenship.

The private member's bill before us today is certainly well intentioned, and we once again praise the member for Vancouver South for his constructive efforts. In the coming weeks, we look forward to addressing the technical issues that would otherwise prevent this bill from achieving its rightful objective.

The government recognizes the commitment and sacrifices that Crown servants and their families posted abroad make to this country.

I am sure that hon. members would also agree that any children born to Crown servants working abroad should not be penalized by not being able to pass on citizenship to any children they may have or they may adopt abroad as a direct result of their parents' service to this country.

Furthermore, there is absolutely no question that Crown servants abroad, including our military, have a connection to this country and we are confident that the changes proposed by Bill C-467 are consistent with the intent of Bill C-37.

There are a few issues with this bill that need to be examined. For example, the bill attempts to extend access to citizenship to the grandchildren of Crown servants by adding a new provision for children born abroad or adopted by Crown servants.

At the same time, it proposes to repeal a section of the act that currently allows all children born to a Crown servant outside Canada to be Canadians, regardless of the generation in which they were born outside Canada.

Similarly, right now, anyone born abroad or adopted by a Canadian parent who was born in Canada, whether or not that parent is a Crown servant, may apply for a grant of citizenship. The criteria for such a grant respect international obligations that are there to protect the best interests of the child and that respect the provincial jurisdiction on adoptions. Under Bill C-467 as it stands now, children adopted by Crown servants would no longer have to apply for a grant of citizenship, which could indeed be problematic.

Nevertheless, I am sure that all members would agree that the bill has a worthwhile objective and that, as Canadians, we should support our Crown servants posted abroad, especially and including military families, and recognize their sacrifice, their commitment and their strong connection to Canada.

That is why I am confident the intent of Bill C-467 can be achieved by expanding the current exception that exists under the law to ensure that the children of Crown servants, including Canadian Forces personnel, like children born in Canada, would be able to pass citizenship on to any children they have or adopt outside our country.

To ensure that the good intentions of Bill C-467 are achieved, I look forward to working co-operatively in the coming weeks with the member for Vancouver South, and all members, toward some constructive amendments.

We have a committee that is currently working on Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act. We are working our way through it. As members know, it is never easy at committee to come to a consensus on absolutely everything. I believe that bill is going to come back to this House, is going to be supported and is going to be passed. For the first time in decades we will have strong and positive change to our refugee act.

At the same time, I think the committee, with all four parties represented there, can come to some common agreement on the bill. The member has a critic who certainly has an open ear and a colleague who has an open ear to ensuring that we do what is right at committee.

I anticipate that we can do the same with this bill. I look forward to the day the member has the opportunity to present at committee and work with us on what I think will be amendments, necessary amendments nonetheless, that would ensure there are no unintended consequences with respect to this bill and the impact it would have on Canadians born abroad.

Support Measures for Adoptive Parents

[Leon Benoit, Conservative, Vegreville—Wainwright, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased today to contribute to the debate on Motion M-386 brought forward by my colleague and friend, the member for Essex. This private member's motion has to do with support for adoptive parents, which is an extremely important issue.

I find it interesting. The motion comes up for the second hour of debate at the same time a motion passed unanimously in the House, which said that we would continue to work toward ending child poverty. I would suggest that there is no more effective way of ending child poverty than having a child become a part of a family, a family that can support and wants to support the child, which is the case when it comes to adoptive parenting.

I really wanted to speak on this issue because I know, as do most people in the House, one couple in particular that has been married 10 years. The couple has tried to have children for 10 years and desperately want children. About five years ago, the couple found out that was not likely to happen. The couple then started the process of trying to adopt a family. It has been an extremely difficult process and it has not been successful so far.

The motion discusses an issue which is extremely important and emotional, not just for that couple but for everyone, I suggest, who thinks about this.

I know the joy of children. My wife, Linda, and I have five grown children.The youngest two are 26. The oldest is 31. We have two sets of twins. I know the joy they have brought us, and continue to bring us. I cannot imagine my life without our children. I know my wife feels the same way. Now there are grandchildren, which is just a lovely, wonderful experience. We are blessed that two of our children have had children. We have three grandchildren, the youngest being a four-month-old granddaughter, Claire, who is just absolutely gorgeous and a delight, as are the two, two-and-a-half-year-old grandchildren.

The joy of children and family is something that most of us understand. It is something that, quite frankly, is more important than anything else I can imagine.

I applaud the member for Essex for seeking to assist families that have been brought together by adoption.

What he has proposed in his motion, specifically, as was mentioned by previous members, is that the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities be instructed to examine current federal support measures that are available to adoptive parents and their adopted children, recognizing and respecting provincial and territorial jurisdictions in this regard, and following completion of this study, to report back to the House.

What does my friend, the member for Essex hope to get from the study? I really cannot speak on his behalf, but I know what I hope will come from this. I sincerely hope this group, after examining the situation, will come back to the House and recommend that adoptive parents be given the same maternity benefits that are now available to parents of children who are not adopted.

I believe family is the basic building block of our society. Everything starts with the family, as my colleagues who have spoken before me have said. Helping families has been a key priority of our government since 2006, and I want to talk about this a bit.

In all our actions to support family, this government has been guided by the principles of choice and opportunity. We believe Canadian parents can be trusted to be do what is best for their children. Our role is not to dictate their choices, but to give them the resources they need to act on this decision, whatever it may be.

Let me start by putting this issue into context by giving a brief outline of the benefits and plans that now exist for parents, specifically, with reference to the employment insurance special benefit system.

The system provides help to Canadians for periods when they cannot work, such as sickness, caring for loved ones or, in the case of the context here, the birth or adoption of a child. When it comes to the issue at hand, the employment insurance special benefits are intended to support parents in balancing the demands of work and family by providing the flexibility they need to stay at home and care for a newborn or newly adopted child.

I can also happily add that our government has put forward Bill C-56, which would extend all of these special benefits, including maternity and parental benefits, to self-employed Canadians, for the first time, on a voluntary basis, which is an important component. I support this measure. Hard-working Canadians do not have to choose between family and work responsibilities any longer.

Maternity benefits are available in the weeks surrounding childbirth and can start up to eight weeks prior to the expected date of birth. These benefits are available to biological mothers, including a birth mother who places her child for adoption. In effect, the 15 weeks of maternity benefits allow a birth mother to be protected from an earnings loss caused by her physical inability to work or to seek work in the weeks surrounding birth.

Some concerns have been expressed that adoptive parents do not have the same access and number of weeks of benefits as biological parents do, which is 15 weeks of maternity benefits offered exclusively to birth mothers. Who knows, this might come out of a study done by the committee.

However, in 2007 the Federal Court upheld the 15 weeks of maternity benefits when it confirmed that there was a distinction between biological mothers and adoptive parents. Biological mothers endure the physiological burdens of pregnancy and childbirth. It is for those reasons that the 15 weeks are offered. Maternity benefits are provided to replace the lost income for those reasons.

The Federal Court endorsed the constitutionality of that arrangement and the Supreme Court, in 2008, declined to hear an appeal in the case. I believe that is appropriate. It is certainly not up to the courts to make our law. That is the role of Parliament. What we are discussing here is the possibility of changing the law and making new law when it comes to this maternity benefit.

As well, all parents can access 35 weeks of parental benefits for the purpose of remaining at home to take care of and bond with their newly born or adopted child. That is available already. These benefits can be shared by both parents.

To return to adoption itself, in Canada, as many in the House are aware, this is an issue that falls under provincial jurisdiction. However, the federal government has a role. The committee that does a study and any debate that may take place in the House certainly would respect the jurisdiction of the provinces when it comes to these issues.

Our Conservative government introduced and saw pass Bill C-14 two and a half years ago. It grants permanent resident status or Canadian citizenship to internationally adopted children and makes that process much quicker and easier. This measure was widely praised and I think it is an example of a job well done by our government.

In the time remaining, I cannot go through the rest of the things our government has done to help families. In most cases, the things our government has done apply to families whether they have adopted children or not.

Once again, I thank my friend and colleague, the member for Essex, for bringing this motion to the House. I support the motion and I encourage every member in the House to support it. It simply asks for a study to be done to determine what is available and perhaps come up with recommendations on what should be available to parents who choose to adopt children.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development and to the Minister of Labour]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to contribute to the discussion on Motion No. 386, as introduced by my colleague, the member Essex. I commend him for his interest in this matter. We should always be interested in ways in which our government and our society are dealing with families, whether it be through law programs or tax treatment.

As we know, most aspects of adoption come under provincial jurisdiction, and my colleague's motion recognizes this fully. Our purpose here is not to intrude into areas of provincial competence, jurisdiction or responsibility. However, even given the province's jurisdiction over adoption, the federal government does have a number of support measures available to adoptive parents, and it is those supports that we propose to examine and evaluate in the study proposed by the motion. I look forward to the motion coming before the committee for study and I am sure we will examine it from the various perspectives, many of which have already been raised today.

I would like to discuss some of the supports that we already provide. Our Conservative government introduced and saw passed Bill C-14 two and a half years ago, which grants permanent resident status or Canadian citizenship to adopted children. I was part and parcel of the process when I was parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. What that bill does is make the process much quicker and easier. This measure was widely praised and it is an example of a job well done by our Conservative government.

Adoptive parents are also eligible for a range of supports that our government provides to families with children, including the adoption tax credit, which helps defray the costs of adoption at tax time.

An important consideration is the costs, both in terms of time and money, associated with adoption. I think we can return to this item and its broader considerations later in my remarks and in the study this motion provides itself.

Adoptive parents also receive the universal child care benefit, which was introduced by this government for each child under the age of six years.

Adoptive parents receive the Canada child tax benefit and the national child benefit supplement for families at low and middle income levels and the child tax credit for parents of all children under the age of 18 years.

I can say that both those programs have had significant financial assistance for low and middle income families.

As I said, working adoptive parents are able to access, in great numbers, the most visible and well-known of these supports, which are parental benefits through the EI system.

Women's access to EI benefits, such as maternity and parental benefits, is very high. Ninety-seven per cent of women working full time have enough hours of work to qualify for special benefits. This is the same level of access as for men. Among women working part time, 62% have enough hours to qualify for special benefits.

So those are some of the specific benefits offered by the federal government.

I will say a bit more about them shortly but, before I do, I again want to emphasize that we believe the family is the basic building block of our society. Everything starts with the family. I have said on many occasions that as the family goes, so goes the nation. Helping families has been a key priority for this government since 2006.

In all of our actions to support families, this government has been guided by the principles of choice and opportunity. We believe that Canadian parents can be trusted to do what is best for their children. Our role is not to dictate their choices but to give them the resources that they need and let them make the decision. This is very fundamental to the programs that we have undertaken.

As a parent myself, I certainly appreciate the wisdom of our government in its approach.

One of the first things we did in 2006 was to begin getting child care funding into the hands of Canadian parents. The centrepiece of our universal child care plan is the universal child care benefit. This benefit, of course, was introduced by the Minister of Human Resources and has proven to be very popular with parents from coast to coast to coast.

The benefit of $100 a month is paid to parents for all children under six years of age. Parents can choose the child care option that best suits their needs, whether that is care from a parent at home, help from family, friends or neighbours, or some more formal child care arrangement.

Of course, the universal child care benefit may also be used to purchase other things equally as important to children and their well-being, such as early learning materials.

We are adamant that parents maintain this freedom over their households and the raising of their children.

As I and many of my colleagues have said, parents know best how to run their homes and how best to raise their children.

Continuing on the track of how parents could use the UCCB, as it is sometimes referred to, they may even wish to deposit all or part of that benefit in a registered education savings plan, which can prolong and enhance the value of the benefit many times over in the long term.

Through the UCCB, our government is providing about $2.5 billion each year to families and is helping about two million young children. We are also helping parents cover the cost of child care through the child care expense deduction. For the average family, the universal child care benefit, together with the child care expense deduction, offsets well over one-third of the cost of non-parental child care if that is the direction the parents wish or chose to go.

We know that many Canadian parents worry about finding good professional care for their children. The demand for child care services simply exceeds the supply. That is why the universal child care plan also provides for the creation of child care spaces.

Since 2007, the Government of Canada has transferred $250 million per year to the provinces and territories for this purpose. Tens of thousands of new spaces have been created across the country. The provinces are also using these funds to improve the quality and affordability of their child care services.

In 2007, our government also introduced a 25% investment tax credit for businesses that create new child care spaces for their employees.

It is important to remind the House that this funding is in addition to the extension of existing funding for agreements with the provinces and territories for early childhood development and early learning as well as child care. This funding totals $1.13 billion this year and will grow to $1.3 billion by 2013-14 under the renewed Canada social transfer.

Few things matter more than ensuring our children can get the best results for a best possible start in life. This means doing everything we can to reduce poverty and improve access to education so that every child has the opportunity for a full and rewarding life.

With the working income tax benefit, we are helping low- and modest-income Canadian families make it over the welfare wall by making work more profitable. The tax-free savings account introduced by our government in 2007 is a groundbreaking measure that allows Canadian families to shelter some of their hard-earned income. It is a powerful incentive for Canadians to save to buy their first house or to invest in their children's education.

In 2007, we also announced the child tax credit which provides families with tax savings of over $300 per year for each child under the age of 18 years. I am happy to confirm that the child tax credit has taken about 180,000 low-income Canadians off the tax rolls. We are providing $9.5 billion a year to families with children through the Canada child tax benefit, including over $3.7 billion to low-income families with children through the national child benefit supplement.

In hearings before the HUMA committee, many witnesses have indicated how beneficial these two programs are to low- and middle-income families. In Canada's economic action plan we raised the income level at which these two benefits start, providing additional support for low-income families.

We need to ensure that the coming generation can compete in the new global economy. That is why we are providing new opportunities for post-secondary education. We have improved the registered education savings plan, RESP as it is commonly known, to help parents save for their children's post-secondary education. We have eliminated the limit on annual RESP contributions and increased the lifetime limit.

Also as a result of changes made through Canada's economic action plan, more low- and middle-income families are now eligible for the national child benefit supplement, which in turn allows them to qualify for the Canada learning bond.

We also want to offer more choice and opportunity to aboriginal families. Working in collaboration with aboriginal communities and the provincial and territorial governments, we support child care, kindergarten and aboriginal headstart, as well as social and health promotion programs for aboriginal people.

In addition, under agreements with the provinces of Ontario and Alberta, we provide funding for on-reserve child care services comparable to services offered by those provinces to families living off-reserve.

Our government also works in cooperation with the provinces and territories through federal initiatives, such as the community action program for children and the Canada prenatal nutrition program.

These initiatives provide long-term funding to community groups for programs that address the health and development of children and families who are judged to be especially vulnerable.

If time permits, let me summarize what the government is doing for families with children.

As I have said, we are providing $5.9 billion in this fiscal year alone in support of early childhood development and child care through measures to the provinces and territories, direct support to families and tax relief for families. Let me recap. That is $1.13 billion to the provinces and territories to support early childhood development and child care, which will increase to almost $1.3 billion by 2013-14.

I would encourage all members of this House to engage proactively in the process when this motion comes before the committee. There are many angles and aspects to this motion that can be reviewed and pursued. The committee itself will look forward to the representations made by the various members of this House and the witnesses that appear before the committee.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the motion before us proposes that the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development, and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, of which I am a member, examine current federal support measures that are available to adoptive parents and their adopted children.

I want to begin by saying that the Bloc Québécois is in favour of having the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development, and the Status of Persons with Disabilities examine this important issue. Adoption is an extremely complex process, from an administrative but also and especially an emotional and psychoaffective standpoint, for both the adopted child and the parents.

In fact, adoption is nothing like it was in the 1970s, for example. Today, in Quebec at least, adopted children come from outside as well as inside Quebec, which means that in about 50% of cases, adoption is also a process of cultural adaptation as well as a source of much family upheaval, as my colleague said. Both the parents and the children can find themselves in situations that are very hard to manage. In other words, they need support.

I am glad to see that the motion seems to recognize that Quebec and the provinces have jurisdiction over adoption. Moreover, Quebec already has very clear, well-established policies on post-adoption services, which I will describe later. In 1999, the Department of Health and Social Services formed a committee to study post-adoption services, which made 11 recommendations in its report.

The committee developed some general guidelines that echoed throughout these 11 post-adoption support recommendations. There were six, and I will mention them briefly: focus on preparation, a step that is often forgotten; work from the premise that that adoption is never easy, either for the parents or the children; “normal” support is better than “marginalizing” support. One of the major challenges for parents and children is finding a way to form family ties that are as normal as possible. So that starts with the support they receive. It is also important to identify and focus specifically on certain key moments: waiting to be matched, the matching itself, the arrival of the child, the child going to school, the adolescent's search for identity, and so on. The support must also be as proactive as possible, meaning that insofar as possible it should be provided in a positive light, rather than as a means of addressing shortcomings. Lastly, it is important to use and improve the existing network of services, instead of developing marginal parallel networks. This means using the existing resources and knowledge, in order to normalize the support, as I mentioned earlier, but also to provide comprehensive multidisciplinary support.

That is why the department of health and social services gave the local community service centres, or the CLSCs, and the youth centres, the mandate of providing post-adoption support in a number of different forms, namely medical, psychological and psychosocial.

Beyond this direct assistance, the Government of Quebec also provides financial assistance to adoptive parents by way of parental leave identical to the leave biological parents receive, which, unfortunately is not the case for Canadians who currently do not have access to maternity leave benefits under the employment insurance system.

The Quebec government also gives a refundable tax credit equivalent to 50% of the adoption fees up to a maximum of $10,000 per child.

In other words, Quebec has developed, with great success I might add, adoption policies that focus on the well-being of the child. That means that any adoption has to give primary consideration to the needs, interests and rights of the child. What is more, the Government of Quebec is following the provisions of the Hague Convention of May 29, 1993, on the protection of children and cooperation in respect of inter-country adoption, by reporting to the countries of origin on the progress of the adopted child in his or her new environment, according to the criteria set out by the child's country of origin.

In summary, I completely agree with the need for comprehensive and structured supports so that parents and children can go through the adoption process with the least amount of turmoil possible. I cannot stress enough—and I am very pleased that this is stated in the motion—the need to respect the fact that adoption is an area under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces and that federal interference in an area where Quebec has clearly developed its own practices is out of the question.

The passage of Bill C-14 in June 2007 eliminated the unacceptable distinction made between Canadian children born abroad and children adopted, while respecting Quebec jurisdictions.

We believe that the federal government's role in adoption is minimal and is limited to two things: offering income tax credits and, for the rest of Canada, administering parental and maternity benefits.

In general, the Bloc Québécois supports the principle underlying this motion, which states that it would be a good idea to study ways the federal government can improve its support for adoptive parents and adopted children.

From our point of view, the federal government's role should be to ensure that adoptive parents and adopted children receive the same benefits from the federal government as biological parents and their children.

According to an Adoption Council of Canada document:

For adoptions to succeed, families must have access to key post-adoption supports—adoption competent therapists, mental health specialists, and doctors; attachment and trauma experts; and parent-to-parent mentors....

In Canada, most adoptive parents lack access to such useful services.

In my speech, I have made it clear that this does not apply to Quebec cases at all. However, I want to emphasize that such inadequacies do not justify federal interference in this area, which comes under Quebec jurisdiction.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

moved:

That the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development, and the Status of Persons with Disabilities be instructed to examine current federal support measures that are available to adoptive parents and their adopted children, recognizing and respecting provincial and territorial jurisdictions in this regard and, following completion of its study, report back to the House with its findings.

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today to speak on my motion regarding the subject of federal supports for adoptive parents.

My Motion No. 386 recommends the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development, and the Status of Persons with Disabilities examine current federal support measures available for adoptive parents, while recognizing and respecting provincial and territorial jurisdiction. Such a study would be beneficial in helping us evaluate current public policy, while shedding more light on issues faced by adoptive parents.

Some hon. members may be surprised to discover that I was adopted as an infant into the care of a wonderful family, and that I count an esteemed senator and Hockey Hall of Fame forward as a relative through my biological mother.

It may come as a further surprise that my wife, Sarah, and I have desired for several years now to add to our five beautiful biological children and adopt a child as well. It is this journey that has connected us to many other Canadians who are seeking to adopt, or who have adopted, and the myriad challenges they face along the way.

I will come back to this later in my comments, but first, let us establish a clear foundation.

The family is the basic building block of society. Everything starts with the family. It is where we raise, nurture and protect our children. It is where we teach them about who they are, where they come from and why they are here. So much of our society's future depends upon ensuring Canadian families receive the proper respect and support they need to ensure their children succeed, learn, grow and take their place in society.

Let us agree that there is equal value for parenting, whether one is a biological or adoptive parent. Let us also agree that there is equal value for children, whether biological or adopted. And let this fundamental accord ultimately find full expression in the policy choices of government.

Currently there are several support measures available to adoptive parents. EI parental benefits are available for working parents. Our Conservative government passed Bill C-14, granting permanent resident status or Canadian citizenship to adopted children, making that process quicker and easier. Adoptive parents are also eligible for a range of supports that our government provides to families with children, including the adoption tax credit, which helps defray the cost of adoption at tax time.

Adoptive parents also receive the universal child care benefit of $100 per child under six and the child tax credit of $2,000 per child under 18, measures enacted by this government. As well, they are eligible for the Canada child benefit and the national child benefit supplement for families with low and middle income levels.

By way of example, and as the most visible support available to adoptive parents, let me speak more fully about the EI program and its special benefits, which include parental benefits.

The EI program currently includes four types of special benefits to support working Canadians when they experience an interruption in earnings owing to childbirth, parenting, illness or the provision of care or support to a gravely ill family member.

The EI program has provided maternity benefits to a maximum of 15 weeks since 1971. These weeks are specifically for birth mothers to recover while they are physically unable to work due to pregnancy or childbirth. Maternity benefits can start up to eight weeks prior to the expected date of birth, and allow biological mothers to recuperate after childbirth and care for their newborn infants during their first weeks after the birth.

The EI program helps both biological and adoptive parents balance work and family responsibilities by providing support for them to stay home with their newly born or adopted child. These are parental benefits and they are payable to a maximum of 35 weeks. Adoptive parents may receive these benefits from the date the child is placed with the new family, and the 35 weeks of parental benefits can be used by either the mother or father, or shared between them.

There are some elements under maternity and parental EI benefits designed to make the program flexible and supportive. For example, if parental benefits are being shared by both parents, only one waiting period needs to be served. If a child has to be hospitalized, parents can choose to claim parental benefits immediately or when the child comes home from the hospital.

Additional benefits are also available to assist low-income families with children through the family supplement, which can increase the basic benefit rate from 55% to a maximum of 80% for claimants with low net family incomes.

A further element of flexibility is parents may collect maternity and parental benefits while out of the country by advising Service Canada of their absence from Canada before leaving.

The EI program also allows parents to work while on claim. Effective as of December last year, our government increased the amount that could be earned while working part-time and receiving EI benefits. Some families require that.

Last, I will not to go into possible maternity benefits for self-employed Canadians except to say that a government bill will ultimately capture that part of the debate.

Biological and adoptive parents share many things. Bringing a baby home is exciting, exhilarating and exhausting. There is a shared concern about having the abilities and the time needed to lay a solid foundation for a healthy relationship with their children. Both biological and adoptive parents need recuperation for emotional, physical and psychological effects of receiving children.

While maternity benefits recognize this for biological parents, currently there is no additional benefit for adoptive parents. There are some real and often little or unknown challenges facing adoptive parents, which birth parents do not face and which need to be considered in the light of public policy.

First, adoption means parents have to prove they are acceptable in order to receive a child and the process is gruelling. The same is not true of biological parents. As one adoptive mother shared with me, “We were meeting with the social worker and watching our family, marriage, children and history get picked apart and analyzed. We spent four months under an intense microscope. They questioned our motives, our communication, our parenting and our marriage. We usually left these meetings feelings wrung out and completely bare”.

The same mother understood the need for ensuring the fitness and commitment of potential parents for adopting a child but, nevertheless, what it underscore is this process is draining and something biological parents do not have to face.

Second, the time before receiving the child can be very different for biological and adoptive parents. Not only is the screening process I spoke of emotionally taxing, but the process of adoption has fees and costs, not to mention the abundant lost work time, and that is income that is not replaced.

Adoptive parents almost always wait longer to receive their child than biological parents. Gestation is usually not longer than nine and a half months. While quick adoptions are available for those seeking a child with special needs, beyond that adoptive parents wait and wait.

Adoptive parents are at a disadvantage to biological parents in the attachment process before receiving a child. Attachment starts for biological parents during the pregnancy. Mom begins to feel and experience fetal development and movement in her own body. Dad can begin to experience and relate to the developing baby in utero, as well. With the marvels of modern ultrasound, biological moms and dads can see their baby long before birth.

Adoptive parents, on the other hand, cannot begin the process of attachment until their child is placed with them. Though, in some cases, like private adoptions, where the mother is known to prospective adoptive parents, the process of attachment can begin earlier. However, there is little freedom to fully enter into attachment for either parents-to-be or a child with remaining ties to the biological mother and the prospect that after child placement, the biological mother can revoke her decision to put the child up for adoption. In most cases, however, the child is unknown to the hopeful parents until the time of placement.

Third, adoptive parents usually have little notice when it is time to receive their child. For biological parents, and as a father of five, with a wife who as a doula or a birth coach has attended some 200 live births, I have a little knowledge about this, normal pregnancy offers many clues to the arrival of baby in the lead-up to birth. As such, maternity benefits can be planned for. For adoptive parents, pre-placement is a wait, then a frantically, or almost chaotically at times, hurry up. Such a situation leaves little or no opportunity to prepare for placement by arranging proper leave from work. In other words, transition is far from seamless for adoptive parents.

Fourth, birth always involves a baby. Adoption does not. The older the adopted child, often the tougher is the transition for parent and child. Older children who are adopted can experience developmental delays or health issues that can complicate the process of attachment to adoptive parents.

Because older children come with a history, either with the biological mother or through foster care, they can often be dealing with issues of loss, trauma, neglect or multiple caregivers. Moreover, barriers to successful parent-child attachment perpetuate the child's inability to form trusting and reliable relationships in life.

Consider Jennifer L. and the transitional difficulties that she, her husband, Jason, their three biological children and her then two-year-old adopted son, who had a history of neglect from his biological mother, experienced. She stated:

“No one will ever convince me that children have less awareness than adults. Sometimes...they're more keenly aware of what is happening. That was true for our little boy. He knew [his biological mother] was leaving him forever and reacted like she was. I've never heard a cry like that one that came out of his little body that day, not before, nor since. He shook with loss, sobbed with loss, fully understood loss and a part of his heart was broken. That's what it sounded like. Five years later we still face it every once in a while: a broken heart more ready to lash out at love than to receive it and more able to test than trust”.

Once our parental rights were established, two weeks after “leaving day” we thought he'd be able to experience a smooth transition into our family. We spent a year thinking that every day. And every day his actions begged that we reject him...If we hugged, he bit. If we praised, he ripped. He banged his head into walls and threw himself off stairs. He rolled screaming from one end of the room to the other for hours and hours - sometimes the entire time he was awake. And we loved and we cried and we despaired and we held on harder. We were told he had an attachment disorder. No one needed to tell us - we lived it. When I considered the attachment I had with my biological children I remembered the time spent holding them as infants, rocking, and cradling them. So we wrapped him in a snuggly and we held him. And he screamed. And we held him longer.

The stress was overwhelming. The bar for adoption had been set so high we felt as though we had barely been approved as parents. Would they now take him away? We were failing. Our children were stressed. They all had eagerly anticipated this little brother. And he had rejected them completely. As a family we decided to make lists of what we were thankful for in him so we could yell them out in the midst of his yelling. He had an amazing giggle. He loved to help. He made us laugh. And when he disconnected from us these kept us holding on”.

Jennifer's experience is not uncommon for parents who adopt children that are older than infants.

We rightly recognize the value of biological motherhood and time together for biological parents and children as a worthwhile investment, but what about adoptive parents? They need their unique circumstances understood by those with a mandate to legislate, to know that their desire to parent is met with policies that support their choice to adopt.

It has been said “It takes a village to raise a child”. With thousands of children in foster care across Canada and children orphaned around the world through famine, natural disaster, civil unrest and wars, those among us able and willing to adopt are key to the well-being of these children and to the building of vibrant families and communities. A grateful society must do all it can to assist them in their parenthood journey.

I call on the House to support this motion to have the HUMA committee study the supports available to adoptive parents. Let it call witnesses to explore the challenges of adoptive parents. Let it examine both domestic and international adoptions. Let it compare what supports are offered in other jurisdictions like Quebec and B.C. Can we find a consensus around two or three issues that, no matter our partisan stripe, we can all support?

Maybe after hearing testimony, committee members will agree with me that it is time for a flexible EI adoption transition leave of comparable length to maternity benefits. Colleagues, I have a vision of a Canada big enough and loving enough to affirm the value of all children. Join with me and vote yes on Motion No. 386.

[Rick Stewart]

In Canada, the situation of individuals who were naturalized is the same as that of individuals born in Canada, whereas the situation of individuals who received a direct grant of citizenship abroad, in the case of an adoption, is entirely equivalent to that of Canadians born abroad.

The objective of Bill C-14 was to provide equivalency for individuals born abroad. Bill C-37 subsequently changed the rules, the requirements for the first generations.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

That was because that was before Bill C-14 came in.

[Mark Davidson]

Yes. If the committee members go to page 44 of the clause-by-clause, I think they'll find the little typo that exists here.

This clause is repeating a lot of the language that exists in Bill C-14, which has recently received royal assent and come into force. There are three provisions here that use the phrase “on or after January 1, 1947” in the English.

In the third example of this phrase, which is the example on page 44—again, only in the English—the word “or” is missing from the provision.

[Mark Davidson]

Mr. Chair, this clause is the clause that has the effect of limiting citizenship by descent and citizenship by adoption to the first generation. As the minister announced in May, and as the committee agreed in December, citizenship by descent would be limited to the first generation, and that is the effect of this clause.

It also has the effect, in the context of adopted children, of indicating.... You will recall Bill C-14, in which the Citizenship Act was amended in order to limit the distinctions between adopted children and natural-born children. This provision also indicates that children who have been adopted abroad will be treated in the same manner as if they had been natural children born abroad.

If a Canadian citizen born in Canada has a child born outside of Canada, that natural-born child would be considered in the first generation. Likewise, if they have an adopted child outside of Canada, that adopted child would be treated the same as their natural-born sibling. That is the effect of this clause.

Message from the Senate

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I have the honour to inform the House that when the House did attend Her Excellency the Governor General in the Senate chamber Her Excellency was pleased to give, in Her Majesty's name, the royal assent to the following bills:

Bill C-12, An Act to provide for emergency management and to amend and repeal certain Acts--Chapter 15;

Bill C-294, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act (sports and recreation programs)--Chapter 16;

Bill S-6, An Act to amend the First Nations Land Management Act--Chapter 17;

Bill C-40, An Act to amend the Excise Tax Act, the Excise Act, 2001 and the Air Travellers Security Charge Act and to make related amendments to other Acts--Chapter 18;

Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Canada Transportation Act and the Railway Safety Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts--Chapter 19;

Bill C-277, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (luring a child)--Chapter 20;

Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act and the Public Service Employment Act--Chapter 21;

Bill C-18, An Act to amend certain Acts in relation to DNA identification--Chapter 22;

Bill C-60, An Act for granting to Her Majesty certain sums of money for the federal public administration for the financial year ending March 31, 2008--Chapter 23;

Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption)--Chapter 24;

Bill C-47, An Act respecting the protection of marks related to the Olympic Games and the Paralympic Games and protection against certain misleading business associations and making a related amendment to the Trade-marks Act--Chapter 25;

Bill C-61, An Act to amend the Geneva Conventions Act, An Act to incorporate the Canadian Red Cross Society and the Trade-marks Act--Chapter 26;

Bill C-42, An Act to amend the Quarantine Act--Chapter 27;

Bill C-59, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (unauthorized recording of a movie)--Chapter 28;

Bill C-52, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 19, 2007--Chapter 29;

Bill C-288, An Act to ensure Canada meets its global climate change obligations under the Kyoto Protocol--Chapter 30.

It being 12:23 p.m., the House stands adjourned until Monday, September 17, 2007, at 11 a.m., pursuant to Standing Orders 28(2) and 24(1).

The first session of the 39th Parliament was prorogued by royal proclamation on September 14, 2007.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I have the honour to inform the House that a message has been received from the Senate informing this House that the Senate has passed the following bills:

Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption).

Bill C-47, An Act respecting the protection of marks related to the Olympic Games and the Paralympic Games and protection against certain misleading business associations and making a related amendment to the Trade-marks Act.

Bill C-61, An Act to amend the Geneva Conventions Act, An Act to incorporate the Canadian Red Cross Society and the Trade-marks Act.

Bill C-42, An Act to amend the Quarantine Act.

Bill C-59, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (unauthorized recording of a movie).

Bill C-52, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 19, 2007.

Bill C-288, An Act to ensure Canada meets its global climate change obligations under the Kyoto Protocol.

Extension of Sitting Hours

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Wascana, SK]

Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that the government, in proposing this motion today, has chosen once again to maintain its habitual lack of consultation and reluctance to attempt a collaborative approach to organizing the business of the House.

On more than one occasion, as I think the Chair will remember, I asked directly whether the government intended to make use of Standing Order 27. As other House leaders can confirm, the reply was, “probably not”. I do not think we would be off base in the opposition in expecting that if that were no longer the case, if the government had in fact changed its mind, that it would have decently given us a heads-up that it was going to propose this motion today, at least given us that notice some time earlier than around one o'clock this afternoon.

Frankly, as we saw the government House leader making his travels across the floor of the House, I will not say where he went, the heckling and yelling as he departed the chamber obviously indicates the kind of demeanour of which we have to deal.

I do not see what there is on the order paper at present that this motion will get through the House any more quickly than would have otherwise been the case. I presume, judging by the government House leader's remarks, that the government is principally concerned with Bill C-52, the budget bill.

It has represented to the House and to the public that the government is now extremely concerned the bill will not receive royal assent in time for certain expenditures to be booked in the appropriate fiscal year. Let us be clear. The fiscal year the Conservatives are talking about is 2006-07, and that is the point.

The issue is retroactive fiscal bookings for the last fiscal year, not the future fiscal year, as members would have gathered from the remarks of the government House leader. If there is concern about the lateness of the date, the government really has only itself to blame.

Usually federal budgets are delivered in or about the third week of February, which then permits the introduction of a budget implementation bill by the end of that month. If things are properly managed, this would permit the bill to be in committee before the end of March and to be passed at all stages by the end of May or, at the very latest, the beginning of June.

This year the government chose, for its own partisan reasons, to delay the budget until the third week of March. We did not even see it until then. Then it unilaterally interrupted the budget debate. Then having finished that, belatedly, it interrupted, again, the second reading debate on the budget implementation Bill C-52. That interruption lasted for three full weeks, getting the bill to committee only in the middle of May.

As a consequence, the government then bulldozed the bill through the committee, breaking procedural agreements, denying many interested and informed citizens and groups the right to testify on the bill. Let it be clearly understood that any procedural issue on Bill C-52 is a direct result of government breaking the agreement on the process, which had been fully settled by members of the committee.

Nevertheless, the bill is now only in its third day of debate at third reading and there is every indication that the third reading and final stage would come to an end in debate in the House by the end of business tomorrow at the latest.

It is important to underscore what these dates are with respect to the budget. Remember that the House resumed in the final week of January. The budget was not presented to the House until March 19, fully eight weeks into the parliamentary sitting. That was followed by a ways and means motion and the introduction of the budget bill, but that was delayed because the government interrupted its own budget debate on the financial principles of the government.

Its budget was late, the budget debate was unilaterally delayed by itself and then it finally got around to introducing the budget bill on March 29, which was debated at second reading for the first time on March 30. It was then debated in a haphazard, sporadic fashion, brought forward to the floor by the government, until April 23, and then it was hoisted altogether. The House did not see it again until May 14, full three weeks later.

Finally, it went to the committee, not as a result of any filibuster by the opposition or any party in the opposition. The delay was entirely the procedural mismanagement of the government. It was there for less than two weeks and one of those weeks was a break week when Parliament was not even sitting.

It finally passed through the committee, rather expeditiously, thanks to the cooperation of the opposition, and it was brought back to be debated at report stage on June 4. For how long? One day, that is all the report stage took. Now it is at third reading where there have been three days of debate, and probably a conclusion could have been arrived at very easily by the end of the day tomorrow.

This is why I made the point at the beginning of my remarks that there really is nothing on this order paper that could not be dealt with in the ordinary course of business without the measure the government House leader has introduced. Obviously it is a tactic to blame the opposition for the delays that lie entirely within the control of the government.

What is it then? If it is not Bill C-52, what is it that causes the government to move the motion today? Despite frequent requests for the government to outline its realistic legislative priorities before the summer, all we have heard repeatedly from the government House leader and from others on the government's side is a flow of partisan rhetoric. Legislation has in fact been moving along through the House and through committees, despite the government's erratic management of its agenda.

In fact, the most controversial bill on the order paper, and this is what gives me perhaps a little hope here, is probably Bill C-30, the clean air act, as it has been revised by members of Parliament. Significantly, only the government has been stalling it up to now. However, now we will have some extra time, some extra hours of sitting every day beginning on Wednesday.

Can we then conclude that the extra time the government is seeking is to facilitate the work of the House in consideration of Bill C-30? I certainly hope so. It is in this fervent hope that I indicate to the House that my party, the official Liberal opposition, will support the minister's motion for the extension of hours.

In the time available, in addition to Bill C-52, which will probably be done tomorrow, and in addition to Bill C-30, which I hope the government has the courage to recall and put before the House once again, the official opposition also looks forward to making progress on Bill C-11, lowering freight rates for farmers, on Bill C-14, dealing with foreign adoptions, on Bill C-23, dealing with criminal procedure, on Bill C-29, dealing with Air Canada and the use of official languages, on Bill C-35, dealing with bail reform, on Bill C-47, dealing with the Olympic, on Bill S-6 and Bill C-51, dealing with land claims and on Bill C-40, the private member's legislation that would provide free postage for mail from Canada to our troops in Afghanistan.

Then there is an item that was referred to in question period today. This is the bill we are anxiously awaiting to see, the one dealing with wage earner protection. I hope the government will follow through on the commitment given in question period, that it will table the bill in amended form so it can be passed at all stages and brought into law before Parliament adjourns for the summer recess.

Let me mention one other matter, which is outstanding and which should be dealt with by the House, or at least dealt with by the government when the House is sitting. This is the examination undertaken a few weeks ago by Mr. Brown in connection with the matters that have been of great concern to Canadians in respect of the RCMP pension fund.

As we understand it, there is a report due from Mr. Brown on June 15. That was the original undertaking given by the Minister of Public Safety. It would be very important for us to know that the examination is on time, that we will hear from Mr. Brown on time, and that the Minister of Public Safety will take the step that he promised to take and make that report public immediately.

Perhaps the government might also consider, in whatever time that remains before the summer recess, reforming its approach to the mood in the House. The mood could be improved if the government would refrain from certain of its more hostile practices. For example: no more gratuitous attack ads, no more broken agreements on how witnesses will be heard, no more manuals about dirty tricks for disrupting parliamentary business, and no more devious games to misuse Standing Orders of the House. A little good old fashioned good faith could change the mood for the better.

Immigration and Refugee Protection Act

[Andrew Telegdi, Liberal, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to join in this debate.

Let me say that at the citizenship and immigration committee there has been a real lack of legislation coming to us from the government.

We recently dealt with Bill C-14, the international adoption bill. Even though the government made a lot of hay about recycling a bill that was before the House under the Liberal government, it has held it up for well over a year. We have very few bills coming before us in committee.The committee, nevertheless, has been spending a great deal of time dealing with very serious issues that need to be addressed.

The bill that is before us today is probably the least serious of something like over a dozen issues that we have identified as a priority. We are disappointed that we are essentially dealing with a bill, the political theatrics of which tries to delve into a problem that for the most part has been solved. We are also concerned about the moralistic tone it takes on.

If the government wants to speak in code to its supporters and say it is against strippers, I would suggest that it introduce a bill in the House to amend the Criminal Code and put forward that amendment. It should not try to be moralistic with back door bills to try to solve a problem which, for the most part, has been solved as far as it pertains to strippers being able to come into this country.

I want talk about some of the other issues that we have been dealing with. We have been dealing with undocumented workers. This has been raised in debate. It is a problem that has been before the government and the government has chosen to ignore it.

When we deal with the issue of undocumented workers, instead of 10 visas that might have been granted in 2005 for strippers, exotic dancers coming into the country, we are talking between 200,00 and 500,000 people who are working in the underground economy because of the dysfunctional nature of our current points system that determines who gets to come to Canada.

I say it is dysfunctional. We need people in the building trades. They cannot get in under the points system. There are many other occupations in which we have a shortage right across the country, and those people cannot come to Canada under the points system.

We heard talk about agricultural workers. It was not too long ago, up around Abbotsford, where the previous speaker comes from, where we heard about members of the Indo-Canadian community getting killed, not on the work site but getting to the work site. It shows us to the extent that agricultural foreign workers are not protected.

We heard about the challenges for live-in caregivers, their working conditions, and how they are virtually indentured to work for an employer. We do not have regulators. We do not have inspectors checking out their working conditions.

We hear about employers being charged every once in a while in very spectacular cases, but the reality is that we are not doing enough to ensure that those people are protected.

Getting back to this bill and getting back to my challenge in terms of talking about stopping strippers coming into this country and using the Criminal Code to outlaw stripping, if it is unacceptable for foreign workers, surely it would be unacceptable to Canadian workers. I do not think the government really has addressed that.

Luckily, I have checked the media and this bill received the kind of coverage that it deserved. For the most part, most major media have dealt with the bill as a political bill, a moralistic bill, and really quite a joke.

The Canadian Council for Refugees says the bill does not address the issue of dealing with trafficking in human beings. As a matter of fact, it falls far short. It essentially says:

The government’s focus on “strippers” betrays a moralistic approach. Instead of passing moral judgment, the government should work on ensuring that non-citizens’ rights are protected and that they have the freedom to make informed choices about their own lives.

The bill fails to address the root problem of the existence in Canada of jobs that humiliate and degrade workers. Work permits can only be issued by visa officers after the employer’s job offer has been validated by Human Resources and Social Development Canada (HRSDC). Why is such work available in Canada if it humiliates and degrades workers?

If Conservatives really believe what they are trying to do, I say to them to pick up my challenge and come in with a bill that addresses that particular industry.

I mentioned there are many issues we have been dealing with at committee and one of the issues was lost Canadians. I drew particular attention to what is happening to the Mennonites in terms of their derivative citizenship. I find it rather sad that a party opposite which has the member for Abbotsford, who is a Mennonite, the member for Edmonton—Sherwood Park as well as the President of the Treasury Board, that they have not brought the plight of the Mennonites to their caucus. They have not had their government make any changes that are so very necessary.

As I said before, the basis of denying derivative citizenship to Mennonites who move from Canada to Mexico is solely on the fact that these folks, with a church wedding, failed to have a civil wedding. Can members believe that? People get married in a church in Mexico and their marriages are not recognized by the government and we deem their offspring to be born out of wedlock.

That is a terrible smear to put on the Mennonites. I really hope that those members, who I have named, will speak up in their caucus and make this a priority issue because it is having an impact, not just on one, two, three or 10 families, but it is having an impact on thousands of people in this country as well as tens of thousands of people who are being denied their rightful derivative citizenship in Mexico. They have ties to Canada but they are told they were born out of wedlock and therefore, they are not entitled to Canadian citizenship.

The other group we dealt with, a group that is of great concern to me, particularly when the government talks about supporting our troops, was a group of war brides and their children. For those who do not know who they are, they are the wives our Canadian soldiers met overseas in Holland, England or someplace in Europe when they were fighting for this country in the second world war. We had just under 70,000 war brides and their children's citizenship is at risk, particularly if a child was born out of wedlock.

While the government promised that it would bring in amendments, those amendments do not apply to these folks. It is not going to apply to Canadian veterans of the second world war who we have been honouring as a nation because the government does not see it as a priority.

At the citizenship and immigration committee we listened to heart-wrenching stories about how people are fighting for their birthrights because they have found out, after living in this country for over 60 years, that they are not citizens and the government refuses to move on that and to change the legislation.

I spoke in the House about Joe Taylor, the son of a Canadian veteran who went to Europe to defend this country and help defend western civilization. He met his girlfriend in England. They were involved and she became pregnant. When Joe Taylor Senior went to his commanding officer to ask for permission to marry, his commanding officer said no because he was going to France to fight and that Canadians did not want to be responsible for widows.

Mr. Joe Taylor Senior went to France and fought but after the war, luckily, he went back to England, married his wife and brought her and their son to Canada. However, because Joe Taylor Junior was born out of wedlock, the government refuses to recognize his citizenship.

Joe Taylor Junior took the refusal of the government to court and, on September 1 of last year, Justice Luc Martineau ordered the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to give Mr. Joe Taylor his citizenship. The judge said that the ground cited by the government that he was born out of wedlock contravened section 15 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The fact that there was an obscure regulation that a person had to apply to retain citizenship if born out of the country, violated section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is the section on fundamental rights.

What did the government do, the supposed defender of our soldiers? On September 26 the government withdrew the court intervenor program, which the House dealt with.

Motion in amendment

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak again today to Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption).

Before I begin, I want to digress for a moment to send best wishes to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration as she is recovering from her surgery yesterday. We hope she has a very fast recovery and is back to her duties as quickly as possible.

In this corner of the House, New Democrats strongly support this legislation. We strongly supported it earlier this year and in the last Parliament when the same bill was introduced by the previous government. We are relieved that it is finally back before the House for report stage and hope that we can do whatever possible to see its passage expedited and finally have this legislation enacted in Canada. This legislation is long overdue and is expected by many people in Canada.

The bill would amend the Citizenship Act to allow a grant of citizenship to a child adopted overseas by a Canadian. It would ensure that adopted children are treated the same as biological children under the provisions of the Citizenship Act. In doing so, it would make citizenship automatic for adopted children, as it is for children born to Canadians. As has been pointed out earlier, it would eliminate the need for an adopted child to first become a permanent resident of Canada and have to apply for full citizenship later.

The New Democrats also support the motion introduced by the government to delete the provision for an appeal to the Immigration and Refugee Board, an amendment that was added during the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration's consideration of the bill.

I will quote directly from the report stage of the bill. The amendment reads:

Any decision of the Minister under this section may be appealed to the Immigration Appeal Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board.

I actually proposed that amendment when we were discussing this legislation in committee so it might seem strange that I now support deleting that addition. I also want to point out that the exact same amendment was proposed by the Bloc Québécois in committee. The amendment by the NDP was the one selected for debate first. All three opposition parties supported the amendment at committee.

Our concern was for an appropriate appeal if there were ever a denial of automatic citizenship for a child adopted by Canadians. I think everyone would admit that that seems unlikely, given the kind of process that is in place regarding international adoptions, but we also know that as humans and as our lives meet, through the laws of the land, especially around issues of citizenship and immigration, there is often a way to find an exception that requires an appropriate appeal, which is where our concern stems.

The amendment also came from a heightened awareness of committee members about appeals in the area of citizenship and immigration, concerns such as the failure of the present and previous governments to implement the Refugee Appeal Division, as provided for in the current Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, and other problems related to the appeal process.

All of us wanted to ensure that there was an appropriate appeal in the legislation for any situation that might arise regarding the citizenship of a child adopted overseas. This position was also suggested and supported by witnesses, including the Canadian Bar Association which called for such an appeal to the IRB. It actually was the Bar's recommendations and testimony before the standing committee when we considered Bill C-14 that this be in place.

The representative for the immigration section of the Canadian Bar Association, Stephen Green, noted that the only option currently, given the provisions of Bill C-14, would be for a judicial review and that it would be a very limited review at that point. That is why this came to the committee's attention and why the amendment was proposed.

I must say that during the committee discussions I listened carefully to the arguments that were put forward by the government and by the parliamentary secretary and I did see some virtue in those arguments.

There was some discussion about withdrawing the amendment at that time but other members of the committee were keen to see it remain and, since the exact same amendment was waiting on the agenda for us, it remained. I did not withdraw it at that time. Since the amendment passed at committee, there has been feedback on the specific appeal proposal, particularly from the government of Quebec but also from other provinces, which were very concerned about its inclusion.

I want to say very clearly that I do not want to see the legislation further delayed. I maintained that position when the parliamentary secretary and the government raised concerns about the appeal since the committee dealt with it. I have always said that if a proposal were brought forward that I would be happy to act on it and give an opinion on it as quickly as possible so that the legislation is not delayed in any way.

Given the concerns that have been raised, now that we have the proposal to withdraw the appeal procedure that is included in the current revision of the bill, New Democrats have agreed to support the motion from the government to remove the appeal provision that was added by the committee.

It is time to get on with this important bill that would make the lives of many families and many children much easier. However, we will watch closely to see if any situations arise that would benefit from a particular appeal mechanism. If so, we, and I am sure other members of the House, will make every possible effort to ensure an appropriate mechanism for appeal is put in place as quickly as possible.

Mr. Speaker, I also know that you were asked to rule on a point of order related to this amendment that we are now talking about, but it appears that it will be removed from the bill since I believe all parties are supporting that step.

I thank you, Mr. Speaker, and your staff for the work that was done to address those issues. I believe it was an important discussion and I want to say that by supporting withdrawing the amendment at this stage, I am not conceding to the government's position on the point of order it raised and which was not upheld by the Speaker's ruling.

While it might seem that the hard work was in vain now that the specific clause is to be removed, I want to express my appreciation for your consideration, Mr. Speaker, and think the issues raised were important to the ongoing operation of the House.

The bill before the House today is a better bill than was proposed to us early in this Parliament. Other amendments made at the committee and which are going forward make the regulatory review and the coming into force provisions of the bill much more explicit.

It was our consideration of what happened with other legislation in the area of Citizenship and Immigration, particularly the concern of members on the committee about the failure to implement the Refugee Appeal Division, that caused us to look more carefully at the provisions for regulatory review and coming into force, to make them more explicit and to put specific timelines specifically on the coming into force provisions.

As a result of those amendments passing, we have a much better bill before us and much greater accountability for the government when it comes to the implementation of this important legislation.

Families and their adopted children have waited far too long for the bill. It has taken two Parliaments to get it through. I hope we are on the verge of accomplishing that, and anything the New Democrats can do to expeditiously complete the task related to the legislation, we are prepared to endeavour to take those measures.

I think there are other places where we need amendments to our citizenship legislation. I am glad the minister recently announced that she would propose in the fall further amendments to deal with the question of lost Canadians but, unfortunately, I believe those are only half measures and do not deal with important situations related to war brides and war children. I am hoping that we can see a better proposal than has recently been announced by the minister when we return in the fall.

We also need to look at the provisions of revocation of citizenship and the oath of citizenship. I believe the Citizenship Act needs a complete overhaul and not just a piecemeal approach as we have been receiving from the government.

I live in hope that we may see a completely new Citizenship Act before the House to be debated, to update some of these important provisions. However, I am glad we are getting on with the question of overseas adoption and facilitating the citizenship of children adopted overseas.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say from the outset that the Bloc Québécois is in favour of Bill C-14, mostly because it respects Quebec's jurisdiction over adoption, by allowing the Quebec government to determine whether an adoption is in accordance with Quebec legislation. Quebec law already protects the rights of children. The Bloc Québécois is in Ottawa to defend the interests of Quebeckers and to defend Quebec's existing jurisdictions.

However, Quebec has to be able to conclude international agreements on adoption because they fall under Quebec jurisdiction. This is still a problem. I will come back to that later. I hope will have enough time to do so.

The bill amends the Citizenship Act to reduce the distinctions in eligibility for citizenship between children born abroad of Canadian parents and foreign children adopted by Canadians. The bill will make it easier for any person who was adopted by a Canadian after February 14, 1977, to obtain Canadian citizenship; it will reduce the requirements for obtaining Canadian citizenship for adoptees who have reached the age of consent and, finally, it will reflect the provisions of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act with respect to obtaining Canadian citizenship.

We have one major concern: this bill must respect Quebec's laws. Thanks to everyone's work, including the Bloc Québécois, of course, but also the Government of Quebec and the negotiations that took place between the federal government and the Government of Quebec, Quebec succeeded in ensuring that its jurisdiction over adoption will be respected. Clause 2 of the bill would add paragraph 5.1(1)(a), which states that the adoption “was in the best interests of the child”, to the Citizenship Act. The Bloc Québécois supports this.

The amended paragraph 5.1(2) states that it is Quebec's responsibility to determine whether or not the adoption meets Quebec's requirements. In other words, this clause says that Quebec is responsible for determining whether or not an adoption complied with the Civil Code and adoption legislation. If the Quebec adoption authority finds that the adoption complied with Quebec legislation, the federal government can grant citizenship to the child. We are pleased that this measure has been introduced and that the Constitution will be respected.

Finally, and this is a little sad, this morning we talked about another proposal concerning the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act to protect workers, for which unanimous consent was sought. The only thing the Bloc Québécois asked for was that the legislation respect Quebec's jurisdiction and the Civil Code of Quebec, but the government refused to support it. That was a little strange, and might even seem paradoxical. We ensured that Quebec's jurisdiction will be respected in terms of Bill C-14, but in terms of another bill relating to the portfolio of a minister from Quebec—even though the minister is from Quebec, or perhaps because he is from Quebec—we were unable to ensure recognition of one very simple principle: respecting Quebec's Civil Code.

Back to Bill C-14. There are already provisions in Quebec's legislation that take into account the best interests of the child. Section 543 of Quebec's Civil Code states that: “No adoption may take place except in the interest of the child and on the conditions prescribed by law”.

Section 32 of the Civil Code states that: “Every child has a right to the protection, security and attention that his parents or the persons acting in their stead are able to give to him”.

Section 33 states, “Every decision concerning a child shall be taken in light of the child's interest and the respect of his rights”.

This has been a long-awaited bill. In granting adopted children citizenship more quickly, the federal government is finally taking account of the best interests of the child.

At present, adopted children are not treated the same as biological children born abroad to Canadian citizens, which, according to a Federal Court of Appeal decision, violates section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Adoptive parents already have a long series of procedures to follow in order to adopt a child.

Speeding up the process to obtain citizenship for these adopted children will thus lighten their burden. What was once an unnecessarily complex process is being simplified and this acceleration will facilitate the integration of these adopted children into their new host society.

Now, another contentious issue remains between the Government of Quebec and the federal government, that is, Quebec's ability to negotiate its own international adoption agreements. We believe that Quebec should be able to conclude its own adoption agreements with other governments. In order for Quebec to exercise its powers in the area of adoption and civil rights, it must be allowed to conclude its own adoption agreements with other countries. However, the diplomatic shackles imposed by Ottawa prevented it from doing so. This was the case with Vietnam, for example, and we all know what happened there.

The Conservative government claims that it is open to Quebec and that is practising a new federalism, but it still refuses to recognize the validity of the Gérin-Lajoie doctrine, which states that anything that falls under Quebec jurisdiction should remain Quebec's jurisdiction throughout the world. This means extending Quebec's internal jurisdictions internationally. This is the Guérin-Lajoie doctrine, which is still not recognized by the federal government. As long as this is the case, Quebec cannot be fully autonomous in its areas of jurisdiction, as originally set out in the Constitution.

Consequently, Quebec cannot take action, any more than other countries can. It is up to Ottawa to move on this issue. It is not up to other countries to interpret Canada's constitution. As long as the federal government tells other countries that it has exclusive jurisdiction over international relations, those countries will refuse to sign treaties with Quebec. We understand, because to act otherwise would amount to interfering in a federal-provincial dispute. Quebeckers find that rather painful. I can just imagine what it must be like for Vietnam to try to follow this sort of debate.

The painful episode of the adoption treaty with Vietnam revealed that the federal position is not only bad for Quebec, but downright dysfunctional and increasingly indefensible. In fact, this episode shows, more eloquently than any speech, that the federal government needs to give Quebec the chance to fully assume its constitutional authorities, including on the international scene. This is just one example that shows how important it is to Quebeckers to achieve full sovereignty, because that will correct all these situations where the federal government is refusing to recognize Quebec's authorities when the time comes to exercise them abroad.

This issue will become increasingly important, because we are living in an age of globalization where there are more and more exchanges. For example, international adoptions are increasing in number. More and more, decisions will be based on country-to-country talks. If, every time Quebec wants to go ahead, it has to engage in years of federal-provincial struggles without even being assured of having some small measure of permission to exist on the international scene, then clearly Quebec society will not be able to move forward.

We also saw this recently at the Kyoto conference in Nairobi, where poor Mr. Béchard, Quebec's environment minister at the time—get this, Mr. Speaker, I know you are sitting in your chair and I hope it is comfortable—asked permission to speak for 45 seconds. The federal government refused. If Quebec had been a sovereign country, it could have talked all week in Nairobi, just like all the other countries. This is one more example that shows the need for sovereignty.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be given an opportunity to speak on this motion today.

This motion is intended to refine Bill C-14, an act that proposes to amend the Citizenship Act to extend automatic citizenship to children who are adopted and were born abroad.

Bill C-14 is a Liberal bill that was introduced in the last Parliament as Bill C-76 under the previous Liberal government.

This legislation seeks to minimize the difference in eligibility for citizenship between adopted and natural-born children of Canadian citizens. Under the current system, parents of children adopted abroad must first apply for a permanent residency for the children and ensure that they meet the residency requirements before they can apply for the children's Canadian citizenship.

There are countless Canadians who are choosing to adopt children who were born abroad, and they are choosing this route for a variety of reasons. Many are building their families. Others choose to adopt abroad to rescue children from very difficult situations in order to provide them with a hopeful and promising life. Canada should work to reduce any existing obstacles that adoptive parents may be facing in their attempts to build upon their family. The very act of adoption and welcoming a new member to a family is a noble act.

While the federal government should refrain from interfering with the family's decision regarding who they adopt, the same government should work to eliminate any barriers that families may face in fully integrating their new son or daughter into the community once an adoption has been approved by the welcoming province.

The process of adoption is a provincial jurisdiction, as my hon. colleague just explained. Once an adoption is finalized at the provincial level, the passage of this bill would ensure that Canadian citizenship automatically would be granted to the adopted child.

Bill C-14 is good legislation. Its objectives are meant to help Canadian families welcome their newly adopted children. This House supported Bill C-14 at second reading and forwarded the bill to the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration for a thorough examination. Last year the committee approved the bill, but in good faith added three amendments that were intended to improve it.

One of those amendments is the amendment that this motion before us intends to exclude. This amendment would provide the opportunity for failed citizenship applicants to appeal the decision to the Immigration and Refugee Board.

As I mentioned, this amendment was tabled in good faith. That is why it was supported by the majority of the committee members. However, upon further examination and consultation, it has been revealed that this amendment may create several problematic and unintended consequences. Many provinces have already expressed concerns that this amendment may result in an infringement of provincial jurisdiction if a province has rejected an adoption application for one reason or another.

The Bill C-14 legislation instructs the Department of Citizenship and Immigration to grant automatic citizenship to the applicant if the applicant has met all of the provincial adoption requirements, thus leaving no discretion where an error of judgment could occur. As such, the necessity for an appeal mechanism is almost non-existent.

The fear is that some may use this proposed appeal process to pressure provinces in their adoption decision process. Some provinces are concerned that if this legislation were to pass as is, an adopted child may enter a province or a territory as a citizen without first having the province formalize the adoption.

If this were to happen, it could cause serious legal and financial implications with respect to child protection. Several provinces have written to the Department of Citizenship and Immigration voicing their concerns about the unintended consequences that may arise if this bill is adopted in its current form with the amendment.

After thoughtful examination of the feedback I received and a detailed discussion I had with departmental officials from Citizenship and Immigration, I believe that it would be prudent to support this motion and agree to remove this amendment.

This is an important piece of legislation. I think many Canadians have been following it with great and keen interest. I think that working with the government to ensure that we have a good bill, one that both respects provincial jurisdiction and fulfills federal responsibilities, is critical. We in the Liberal Party never place politics ahead of good policy and we are determined to perform our duty of delivering good legislation.

I look forward to voting on this motion as quickly as possible so we can get back to the business of passing Bill C-14 in this chamber. I sincerely hope that once this motion is adopted the government will move quickly to bring the bill back to the House for its final reading.

In closing, I want to express my grateful thanks to the officials at Citizenship and Immigration Canada for taking the time to brief me on this motion. The information session they provided was pivotal in helping me conclude that supporting this motion is the right thing to do for this bill and for Canadians.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-14, a bill designed to address a provision in the Citizenship Act. This bill reduces the distinction between natural born children of Canadian citizens and foreign born children adopted by Canadian citizens.

Every year Canadian parents welcome into their families children born in another country. These adoptive parents are Canadian citizens. The adopted children become part of a family, but their parents must complete yet another step before their children can officially be part of the Canadian family.

We are talking about the adoption of foreign born children, often barely out of infancy. Our government believes that Canada should welcome them as warmly as their adoptive family.

This government is taking action through Bill C-14 to grant citizenship to foreign born adopted children without their first having to become permanent residents. We promised to support Canadian parents who adopt foreign born children. We promised parents that we would grant citizenship to their adopted children if the adoption met the requirements of the bill which will protect the best interests of the child and Canada and which recognizes the jurisdiction of the provinces and the territories. This legislation, Bill C-14, delivers on these promises.

We need to make it easier for Canadian parents to obtain Canadian citizenship for their foreign born adopted children whether the parents reside in Canada or abroad. We need to give children adopted overseas access to citizenship without first having to apply for permanent residence. And we need to show Canadians that we want new families to be able to come together as quickly as possible.

The legislation before us today is the product of extensive study and consultation. This issue has been examined by several standing committees in previous sessions of Parliament.

Parliamentarians support the principle of this legislation, but most important of all, Canadians support the principles of this legislation. At the same, if we are to fulfill our duty as parliamentarians, we must remove the amendment to Bill C-14 referred to in the motion which adds an appeal to the Immigration Appeal Division for adopted persons only whose application is refused under the provisions of Bill C-14.

There are jurisdictional issues that are of significance. It is important to remember that in Canada the matter of adoption falls within the jurisdiction of the provincial and territorial governments.

In the case of adoptive parents living in Canada, the province or territory where the parent resides is an integral part of the adoption process. Bill C-14 as it was originally drafted does not alter or interfere with that. However, the introduction of the proposed amendment to create a separate appeal mechanism has the potential to undermine the role of the provinces and territories as the competent authority in a receiving country.

The Department of Citizenship and Immigration has consulted with the provinces and territories on the implications of the proposed amendment. In general, they are very concerned that the inclusion of the Immigration Appeal Division as a separate appeal mechanism will usurp their authority by permitting the granting of citizenship on humanitarian grounds.

I would like to quote from a letter received from the Quebec minister of immigration and cultural communities voicing the province's strong objection to the adoption of this amendment. The letter states that the authority of IRB members could interfere with Quebec's constitutional jurisdiction with respect to civil rights, as members could, in some cases, grant citizenship to a child whose adoption may not comply with Quebec requirements according to Quebec's international adoption authority. The letter also states that in addition to the constitutional issues raised here, such a decision would have a major impact on the individuals involved. It goes on to say that if an adoption is not recognized in Quebec, then a new parent-child relationship cannot be established and a pre-existing parent-child relationship cannot be terminated.

If the Immigration Appeal Division grants citizenship to the adopted child without the province approving the adoption, there is a real concern that a child could be in the province as a citizen without a legal parent. We must remove the proposed amendment to ensure that this bill respects the jurisdiction of our provinces and our territories which are partners in this issue.

The proposed amendment to Bill C-14 to add a mechanism for an appeal to the Immigration Appeal Division for adopted children only would, if passed, create a discrepancy within the Citizenship Act. It would create a separate appeal mechanism only open to a select few.

For programs to work well, they must be fair and apply consistently. The current Citizenship Act has an appeal mechanism in place for the Federal Court system. The introduction of an alternate appeal mechanism in the case of adopted children would not enable us to maintain fair and equitable citizenship programs.

This government recognizes that Canadian citizenship is valuable. We have a responsibility to protect it and make sure it is granted appropriately. I can assure hon. members that we have taken note of the concerns that were identified through our consultations and we are taking action that is necessary to address them.

This bill addresses the possibility that some individuals may seek to adopt children merely to help them acquire citizenship, so-called adoptions of convenience, adoptions that are taken for no other reason than to acquire status in Canada. However, if the proposed amendment is allowed, Bill C-14 would no longer be able to guard against adoptions of convenience in the same way.

We designed Bill C-14 to maintain a number of safeguards to deal specifically with these concerns and to ensure that Canadian citizenship is protected. The safeguards include the existence of a genuine parent-child relationship, and that relationship must be demonstrated. It must be clear that the best interests of the child are met. A proper home assessment must be completed where applicable. The birth parents must give their consent to the adoption. No person will achieve unwarranted gain as a result of the adoption, or it will not be allowed. The proposed amendment does not contain these safeguards.

In conclusion, Canada is diligent in maintaining the integrity of the citizenship process and in protecting children. We must act in the best interests of the children and in the best interests of Canadian families who have opened their hearts and their homes to provide love and opportunity to the children.

Let us all support the efforts of Canadian families. I urge all members of the opposition to do the right thing and support the deletion of the immigration appeal division amendment, so as to ensure that this bill respects the jurisdiction of our provincial and territorial partners and can be passed without further delay, so the process is open to those who wish to proceed with adoption and have it confirmed by citizenship upon the adoption being granted.

Speaker's Ruling

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

I will now convey to the House a ruling by the Speaker on Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption). There is one motion in amendment standing on the notice paper for the report stage of Bill C-14. Motion No. 1 will be debated and voted upon.

The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption), as reported (with amendments) from the committee.

Business of the House

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, with regard to the last point, we have already addressed that.

However, with regard to the balance of Thursday's statement, I am pleased to respond that today and tomorrow we will continue with Bill C-55, the expanded voting opportunities bill; Bill C-14, the adoption bill; Bill C-57, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act; and Bill C-45, the fisheries act.

In the last Thursday statement, we indicated that we were hoping to have this week as “enhancing the quality of the life of first nations people week” but this was cancelled by the opposition parties when they did not release Bill C-44 from committee, the bill that would give the first nations protection under the Canadian Human Rights Act. Not only is it being held up now but, as early as this morning in this House, the opposition obstructed our efforts to get the bill dealt with forthwith so that first nations people could have the human rights that every other Canadian enjoys. We know that if all parties would agree to proceed with that, as we saw when we sought unanimous consent, it could proceed, but some would prefer to obstruct it.

Next week will be welcome back from committee week, when we welcome business that has been at committee, including some that has been stalled there for some time. We will deal with Bill C-52, the budget implementation bill, which will begin report stage on Monday and, hopefully, we can get third reading wrapped up by Tuesday.

Following the budget bill, we will call for report stage and third reading of Bill C-35, bail reform. After that, we will call Bill C-23, the Criminal Code amendments. I hardly remember when Bill C-23 was sent to the committee by this House. That took place long before I was even House leader 228 days ago.

Thursday, June 7, shall be the last allotted day. There are a number of other bills that we would like to include in our welcome back from committee week. I still hope we can see Bill C-44, the amendments to the Canadian Human Rights Act, to which I just referred; Bill C-6, the amendments to the Aeronautics Act; Bill C-27 dealing with dangerous offenders; Bill C-32 dealing with impaired driving; and Bill C-33 dealing with foreign investment, if the opposition parties will release those from committee.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Thank you for the question, and I do appreciate you standing in today.

We've actually achieved quite a lot. The previous government introduced a tax, if you like, of almost $1,000 per newcomer to Canada. We cut that in half. This is money that's used to help newcomers integrate into Canadian society. Whereas those levels had been frozen for almost a decade, we added $307 million of new money. That's good news.

We've made it possible for the first time for university students to work off campus for up to 20 hours a week. Prior to that they could work on campus, but we want to help them get involved in their communities, expand their work experience, and make them more valuable employees in the future.

We've also made it possible for temporary foreign workers and for the self-same university students with experience to apply under certain conditions to stay in Canada, apply for their permanent residence from within Canada. No longer will they have to leave and make application and then come back.

As well, we've improved and streamlined the temporary foreign worker program, making it more responsive by opening up special offices in the west to help employers. We've worked with the provinces, with B.C., Alberta, and Ontario, and we're in the process with others, on making lists of occupations under pressure. These are occupations where we know there's a shortage of workers. So when employers come looking for a labour market opinion and ask can they bring someone in, and we're saying no, you can skip that step and go find your people and bring them over. We're accelerating the responsiveness to the labour market needs.

So we've done a lot of things. We've also brought in Bill C-14to help adoption and to help adopted children become Canadian citizens more readily. We've introduced Bill C-57, which is to help protect and keep newcomers to Canada from becoming sexually exploited or abused or subject to human trafficking, and then today I just announced that we want to bring forth further legislation, amendments to the Citizenship Act, to help.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

First of all, what I'd like to do is congratulate the committee on the fine work it has done in terms of what needs to be done with the Citizenship Act and the changes to be made to it. Unfortunately, the three prior bills that were brought forward by the previous government all got dropped on the table; that's why we're making efforts now with Bill C-14, Bill C-57, and the legislation that I'm proposing to table in the fall to address some of the problems that have been raised by this committee. I hope that because of that we will have the support of the committee.

In terms of revocation, there is a process that was followed with these individuals. The process was initiated under the previous government. It has taken many years because as a country, and regardless of political party, Canada has taken the position that we will not be a safe haven for war criminals. It's just that simple. There is a legitimate process in place through the Federal Court, and that is the process we have begun.

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

I'm sorry. I thought I'd lost my audience for a moment. As an actor, I feel bad when that happens. I recognize Madam Redman is hanging on my every word, and she was interrupted, so I just thought I'd give her the chance not to miss anything.

But back to the relevant—We are not talking about substantially what's in the bills. We're talking about if they are substantially similar. If they are found to be substantially similar, then you must rule it non-votable. That's the rule. It's not about whether, in my party or in your party, this is the type of bill we'd like to see move forward. That's not what this is about, because as I've already explained, with Mr. Benoit or even Mr. Dion's bill or even Ms. Bell's bill, we're totally non-partisan as to what's not votable. We seem to have done it all. So this is about this committee defending its subcommittee and letting it go forward and doing its work.

The subcommittee has done its work well. We think it's moved forward on the changes to the criteria. We think we've moved forward on the changes to the remedies to what happens should somebody's bill be moved non-votable, and of course we believe we've done the work well on moving forward the legislation as being non-votable. That was one of our true missions. That's what we're really discussing here today: Is Bill C-415 votable or non-votable, versus the criteria we've already set?

Mr. Silva came before us the other day and talked about some of the other additions to the bill. But as I said, we've already covered the fact that “substantial” and “substantially” is what we're trying to deal with here. Is the bill substantially the same? If you really compare them—clause-by-clause, word-by-word, word search versus word search—you find them to be, with a few changes, with the word “essential” added a couple of times, but the purpose in the end seems to be fairly identical, I dare say substantially similar. I dare say it because “substantially similar” is the only criterion we need to meet. If we would like to, in fact—and that brings me to the point in the work of the subcommittee—the subcommittee was charged by the Speaker to look at the criteria used for private members' business. We did, and we've added a small piece to this one criterion so in the future we could come to non-votability at an earlier stage.

But I challenge this committee, if you would like us to look at the word “substantially”. If that's not the criterion you'd like us to use for finding similarity between two pieces of legislation, then please bring forward—this is procedure and House affairs—that you'd like us to look at the criterion we're using. We have looked at it already. With the help of the great researchers and the clerks, we'd be happy to look at the criteria again. If you're judging your subcommittee on doing its work improperly, perhaps you're misinterpreting the word “substantially” and perhaps you're misinterpreting some other words in there. Or perhaps we are. Perhaps you'd like us to change the word to be “—if two exact bills come forward—”. If that's indeed what you're looking for, then that's easy. It would have to match word for word and we'd be able to set that and set the criteria that would be very easy for us to judge. We could almost do it on paper without even having to meet.

But it has a subjective meaning to it in the fact that it says “substantially the same” or “substantially similar”. So here we are trying to deal with substantially similar pieces of legislation. Your subcommittee has ruled they are substantially similar and has written a report to this committee that says that. We'll be looking forward to this committee's backing up the subcommittee to that effect and saying we agree with the work the subcommittee has done.

As I stated earlier, we also brought back a full report, not only on the non-votability of this bill, but on the changes to those criteria. I think I've covered that enough. But the other piece we also covered in there was the remedy. I referred before to how hard it was in previous years for private members' business to come forward.

So we really do look forward to the fact that now, even if we find a piece of legislation non-votable, even if that truly does happen, we have a remedy for those people to move forward and put forward other pieces of private members' business. So they can, in fact, represent the people in their ridings and the people of Canada well by still putting forward legislation. Your subcommittee has also done that work. There are some true changes built in there, because it could be treated differently.

I'll start down the road of summarizing where I've been. I think we'll talk about the different rulings we've made here. We've talked a lot about the overall subcommittee report on private members' business and what was votable and what was non-votable. And we've moved that forward to give Mr. Silva the chance to come forward. And Mr. Silva did come forward the other day and told us his views on why he thought the subcommittee had perhaps gone too far in thinking of what was votable and what was non-votable.

The other piece he discussed with us was a ruling from the chair. I think I covered a bit of that earlier, but I'll look at this. These are really two different events in the course of this same private member's bill. The Speaker made a ruling from the chair at a point the day before or the day after the Subcommittee on Private Members' Business had met. He was being asked at the time to rule it in order or out of order, and he was in the middle of his ruling when the member for Scarborough—Rouge River, I believe, stood and asked the Speaker that day if he knew that the subcommittee was meeting and that their decision was pending. And the Speaker said thank you very much for the information and carried on.

So we recognized at that point that we were really dealing with two different rulings, if you will. There was the ruling on non-votability by the subcommittee, and that's what we're discussing here today, and then, as Mr. Silva brought up, there was the ruling by the Speaker.

I brought it up earlier, and I certainly have a copy of the Speaker's ruling here. As I said, other than when he may have been interrupted and asked by the member for Scarborough—Rouge River about the non-votability of it, the word “non-votability” is not in here. So he ruled the bill in order, and as I stated earlier, I certainly interpret that to mean that it's in order.

Mr. Silva's bill could easily go forward and be discussed, as could Mr. Benoit's bill. Mr. Benoit chose to do that when his was deemed non-votable. He chose, in fact, to move forward, because his bill was still in order as a private member's bill; it had just been deemed non-votable. So he was able to bring the bill forward and then have it discussed at each reading in the House. At the end of the day, it certainly wasn't voted on, because it was non-votable. Mr. Silva has exactly the same ability to do that if he would like.

There are other options, as I said. There are other remedies he could seek such as putting forward a different piece of legislation or another one of his own that he already has on the order paper or something else that could come forward.

Mr. Chair, I think we are sometimes, in this House, drawn along party lines. There are certainly times during votes in the House when we can expect to see which party will stand for which issues and which parties will stand for other issues. I know that in the party I serve and am proud to serve, we have the ability to vote differently when it's private members' business. We have the ability to stand on our own conscience on private members' business. We have the ability to vote our conscience.

It may seem from time to time that our conscience is always right, that that's true, but we do have that ability. I recognize that there are other parties in this House that do the same thing. Mr. Godin I'm sure would say it about his. I'm sure that all parties would say that when it comes to private members' business, we get a little bit different on how we vote. This is a piece of government legislation, and of course it may challenge us to the end.

Sometimes you read into it because you know the person whose piece of private members' business it is, you've had personal time with them at some point or you've been on committee with them, and you know them from other places, so you know them to be good and honourable people, so you choose to vote with them or against them, not only based on the piece of legislation that comes forward, because a lot of times it may or may not affect your individual riding directly, so you sometimes will make the decision based on even who the person is who's bringing forward the legislation.

That does happen in private members' business. I'm sure I've seen it on your side of the House or on other sides of the House, and it's the same as ours. When it's one of our colleagues whose private member's business is up for vote that night, they're extra friendly, they're coming around and making sure you're going to be there, they're coming around to see how you'll vote, and sometimes I think that truly happens in all parties.

Truly, I've met some of my colleagues from all of the other parties when it was there, for their bill to be voted on, and that surprisingly I'm running into them, even just outside my lobby to try to give that little extra twist at the end to say yes, I need your help tonight, and I hope you'll give it. As I said, sometimes you know the person well, and other times you know them only from passing, but it's a wonderful sight to see when a standing vote takes place. As you see, we often try to apply so many votes in this House because we like to get on to other things sometimes, but in private members' business we often don't; we give the member the courtesy of watching the members stand for a standing vote. Even when we sometimes know what the outcome will be, whether the outcome will be a sheer pass or even unanimous, as we've seen in some of the votes that we've done even this year in this House.

We see the numbers wanting that standing vote to take place because it's a special time for them, they've taken a lot of work and effort not just to put the bill forward. That may sometimes be the easy part, but the work and effort of seeing it through different readings in the House, and seeing it through the committee work that sometimes has to happen on a piece of private members' business, there's something very special about having a piece of private members' business move forward. I'm very pleased to say that I find that part of the job a very enjoyable piece, and I don't take the job lightly of looking at private members' business to ensure that we're bringing forward true and good pieces of legislation.

Pardon me for just a second.

Truly, the answer isn't about your colleagues putting forward pieces of legislation and whether they're good people. As I said, Mr. Silva and I know each other reasonably well, but that wasn't about whose name was on the bottom of the bill; it was about the criteria we used in order to look at the bill and compare it to others and compare it to the fact, and compare it to what will move forward. I guess that's the answer.

[Andrew Telegdi, Liberal, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I dare say we will have many more meetings at which we'll get to discuss this, because the answers we are getting and the rationale we are getting are, I think, totally unsatisfactory.

You know, to say that a law exists.... Well, instead of fixing discriminatory laws that have been judged by the courts to be not compliant with the charter, they're litigating them. We're wasting resources litigating them. And to say that Bill C-14, on international adoptions, is the priority I don't think is acceptable.

I want to commend you, Mr. Davidson, for pointing out to the committee that the previous government had $20 million to fix the Citizenship Act. When this government came into office, they cancelled it. So I just want to thank you for making the committee aware of that.

Yes, it's a good thing you know this: $20 million, just to repeat it.

Now, one of the problems I have is dealing with the bureaucracy. This whole citizenship thing is incredibly Kafkaesque, as was stated by The Economist. We're the laughingstock of the world. It seems to me that if civil servants in Trinidad and Australia can fix their acts, we should be able to fix our act too, instead of wasting money on putting people like Mr. Chapman...or else turning a tenth-generation Québécois into a first-generation Canadian, denying her heritage. It's a bad law.

I've been on this committee for a long time, Mr. Davidson. I sat through Bill C-63, twice introduced to Parliament, to the committee, with extensive hearings. I sat through Bill C-16. I sat through Bill C-18. In not one of those cases has the department alerted the committee or the minister...because I don't believe the ministers knew about this problem. It wasn't until Mr. Chapman came forward, I believe in 2003, that I was alerted, that the committee was alerted that this problem existed.

This problem has been going on for a long time; I think it's really critical that we understand it. And I believe it is the job of the bureaucracy to alert the minister.

I will read from a letter written in 2005 to Mr. Siksay, signed by Minister Volpe, as follows:

The Canadian Citizenship Act, which came into force on January 1, 1947, automatically granted Canadian citizenship to women who were married to Canadian soldiers overseas before that day. Children born to these couples also obtained citizenship automatically, by birth on Canadian soil or through their Canadian father, if born outside Canada.

I mean, that's what a politician will know. That's what a minister will know. And if you believed that, Mr. Chapman wouldn't have a problem. All those folks wouldn't have a problem.

In 1999, on the CIC website, it said that if you were born in Canada, you were a Canadian. The fact of the matter is that I have served that length of time on this committee, and I did not know about this whole issue until it came to 2003.

I think the lost Canadians listening to us—and they are many—are pulling out their hair. They really are pulling out their hair at the complacency and the answers they are getting from the bureaucracy.

Conferring subsection 5(4).... This was done to Magali. It turned her from a tenth-generation Québécois into a first-generation Canadian—just unbelievable.

My question to you—And there are going to be many more coming, because this just won't do. I have the question for every member here.

Will you tell us, Mr. Davidson, did you get together and caucus and talk about what you were going to say at this committee—that you're going to stick to your 450 numbers and about what kind of evidence you're going to get? Did you do that?

I want an answer from every one of you at the table; just yes or no.

[Mark Davidson]

I understand Bill C-14 is in the House at report stage.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Where is Bill C-14 now?

[Mark Davidson]

They have all died on the order paper. The minister has indicated and the former minister had indicated that their legislative priorities were Bill C-14.

[Mark Davidson]

Probably the best example would be that piece of legislation the minister has indicated is a priority, and that's Bill C-14. We're aware that the treatment of adopted children, or children who have been adopted by Canadians outside of Canada, is not what it should be. Via the subsection 5(4) mechanism, we have a way to resolve these individual cases, but it's not an ideal situation. There is a bill in the House at the moment that is dealing with resolving that particular problem in citizenship.

Bill C-257—Canada Labour Code—Speaker's Ruling

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

On February 26, 2007, a point of order was raised by the Leader of the Government in the House to the effect that amendments adopted by the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in its consideration of C-257, An Act to amend the Canada Labour Code (replacement workers) and reported to the House on February 21, 2007, are inadmissible.

The hon. members for Davenport, Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean, Scarborough—Rouge River and Windsor—Tecumseh have also now presented their arguments on the matter.

As the House knows, the Speaker does not intervene on matters upon which committees are competent to take decisions. However, in cases where a committee has exceeded its authority, particularly in relation to bills, the Speaker has been called upon to deal with such matters after a report has been presented to the House.

In terms of amendments adopted by committees on bills, if they were judged to be inadmissible by the Speaker, those amendments would be struck from the bill as amended because the committee did not have the authority to adopt such provisions. As the hon. Member for Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean reminded us, this is succinctly explained in a ruling of Mr. Speaker Fraser on April 28, 1992 at page 9801 of the Debates:

When a bill is referred to a standing or legislative committee of the House, that committee is only empowered to adopt, amend or negative the clauses found in that piece of legislation and to report the bill to the House with or without amendments. The committee is restricted in its examination in a number of ways. It cannot infringe on the financial initiative of the Crown, it cannot go beyond the scope of the bill as passed at second reading, and it cannot reach back to the parent act to make further amendments not contemplated in the bill no matter how tempting that may be.

This is precisely the kind of case that I am being asked to adjudicate today.

Before getting into the substance of that case, I want to comment briefly on a precedent cited earlier today where the admissibility of an amendment adopted in committee was challenged, though on rather different grounds than the case before us now.

The hon. Member for Roberval—Lac St-Jean referred to the ruling handed down by the Speaker on October 26, 2006 with respect to Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption). Although the Member for Roberval—Lac St-Jean is right in citing that decision as an example, he gives it his own interpretation. In that particular case, the Speaker carefully examined, one by one, the amendments adopted by the committee and concluded that, as regards strict compliance with procedural rules, the committee had not exceeded its powers in adopting the amendments challenged by the government.

The case before us is rather different. Given the very narrow scope of Bill C-257, any amendment to the bill must stay within the very limited parameters set by the provisions of the Canada Labour Code that are amended by the bill.

I have reviewed with great care the text of Bill C-257 as adopted at second reading, the text of the amendments adopted in committee, the relevant sections of the parent act, the Canada Labour Code and, of course, the arguments presented by the hon. members who intervened on this matter. I am now ready to rule.

In relation to the first amendment, the government House leader contends that an amendment proposed in committee by the hon. member for Davenport to clause 2, subparagraph 2.1, is inadmissible because it attempts to make the bill “subject to section 87.4” of the Canada Labour Code. As the hon. member for Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean noted, the first reading version of the bill already contained this exact phrase within subparagraph 2.1(c); the amendment simply repositioned it within the same subparagraph.

Therefore, the Chair is of the view that this amendment can be characterized as a reference to section 87.4, rather than as an amendment to the Canada Labour Code dealing with the maintenance of services. As such, this amendment to subparagraph 2.1 does not import matters which are beyond the scope of the bill and is therefore admissible.

The admissibility of two other amendments to clause 2, both proposed by the hon. member for Davenport, is also in dispute. The first is to subparagraph 2.3 and introduces the concept of “essential services”. After hearing ample discussion in committee on the admissibility of this amendment, the committee chair found the amendment to be beyond the scope of the bill and ruled it inadmissible. That ruling was challenged and overturned, and the amendment was subsequently adopted. The second disputed amendment, this one to subparagraph 2.4 and also dealing with “essential services” enjoyed the same fate.

The hon. members for Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean and Windsor—Tecumseh have maintained in their arguments that these two amendments serve to clarify the intent of the main provisions of Bill C-257. They argue that these amendments are admissible for they only make clearer the bill's provisions with respect to replacement workers as these relate to the continuation of essential services.

I fully appreciate the arguments that my hon. colleagues are making. However, I fear that their views are precisely what Mr. Speaker Fraser meant in the 1992 ruling cited earlier when he warned members against being led into the temptation of amendments not contemplated in the original bill.

Hon. Members will know that Bill C-257 is limited in its scope. As the summary of the bill adopted at second reading explains:

The purpose of this enactment is to prohibit employees under the Canada Labour Code from hiring replacement workers to perform the duties of employees who are on strike or locked out.

Bill C-257 amends three sections of the Canada Labour Code: section 87.6 dealing with the reinstatement of employees after a strike or lockout, section 94 dealing with prohibitions relating to replacement workers, and section 100 dealing with offences and punishment.

Clause 2, where the two remaining disputed amendments lie, addresses section 94 dealing with prohibitions relating to replacement workers. Clause 2 in the original bill does not touch section 87.4 which is the operative provision of the Canada Labour Code dealing with essential services.

Indeed, it is worth noting that the very phrase “essential services”, although one with which we are all familiar, is not a phrase found in the Labour Code. The Labour Code does not use the term, but refers to “maintenance or continuation of activities to prevent an immediate and serious danger to the safety or health of the public”.

The first amendment imports the new concept of essential services into a clause originally addressing employers' right to protection of their property. As for the second amendment, while it does not actually directly seek to amend section 87.4, it nevertheless does reach back to the parent act and import into Bill C-257 the terms of reviews of orders made by the board under subsection 87.4(7), concepts not found within the bill as adopted at second reading.

Therefore, on strictly procedural grounds, the Chair must conclude that the ruling of the chair of the committee was correct: these last two amendments do go beyond the scope of the bill as adopted at second reading and are therefore inadmissible.

Pursuant to this decision, I must order that the two inadmissible amendments to clause 2, subparagraph 2.3 and 2.4 adopted by the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities be declared null and void, and no longer form part of the bill as reported to the House.

In addition, I am ordering that a reprint of Bill C-257 be published with all possible haste for use by the House at report stage to replace the reprint ordered by the committee.

Since report stage on this bill is to be taken up tomorrow, I have advised the Table officers to take appropriate action to ensure that any report stage motions of amendments submitted this evening are in proper form. As hon. members know, they must be submitted by 6 p.m. tonight.

I therefore wish to thank the House for giving me the opportunity of addressing this complicated and somewhat unusual situation.

Bill C-257—Canada Labour Code

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as I indicated yesterday, I have more information to add to the arguments that I presented on Bill C-257 and the admissibility of the amendments that affect this bill.

During the meeting of the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities on Thursday, February 15, the chair ruled on the admissibility of two amendments, and despite contrary opinions from the witnesses and the committee clerk, he nonetheless ruled the proposed amendment inadmissible because it was beyond the scope of the bill.

The purpose of the amendments is essentially to include in the anti-scab legislation the concept of essential services for the maintenance of activities in labour disputes in clauses 2.3 and 2.4 of the bill to amend section 94 of the Canada Labour Code.

The committee chair's ruling was overturned since three of the opposition parties, forming the majority in committee, felt that this concept was not beyond the scope of the bill.

Yesterday, the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons brought this up again in a point of order and went a step further in his argument than the chair of the committee did. He said that the three amendments proposed in committee were inadmissible.

Our current situation is rather unusual. Precedents concerning the admissibility of amendments proposed in committee are rare in this House. However, we note that, in 1992, Mr. Speaker Fraser faced a similar situation. The context was this: during a committee review of Bill C-54 concerning farm products marketing agencies, the committee chair ruled that three amendments were inadmissible, because two of them sought to amend the incorporating act, and the third amendment went beyond the scope of the bill. As in the current situation, the committee chair's ruling was reversed. Regarding the constraints imposed on the amendment process in committee, Mr. Speaker Fraser said:

It cannot infringe on the financial initiative of the Crown, it cannot go beyond the scope of the bill as passed at second reading, and it cannot reach back to the parent act to make further amendments not contemplated in the bill no matter how tempting this may be.

Furthermore, Mr. Speaker Fraser gave a clear example:

In some cases, this last cardinal rule is graphically clear. For instance, if a committee is examining a Criminal Code bill dealing with lotteries, a member cannot reach back to the parent act to propose amendments to those sections dealing with firearms. In certain other cases, this principle is more difficult to explain.

Based on this ruling by Mr. Speaker Fraser, it is quite simple to demonstrate to the House that the amendments proposed to Bill C-257 concerning the provision of essential services in the event of a labour dispute do not go beyond the scope of Bill C-257.

Moreover, during this session, you yourself ruled on the admissibility of committee amendments to Bill C-14. These amendments sought to include an appeal process in the Citizenship Act (adoption). At that time, you reversed the decision of the committee chair. Your ruling was completely justified, because including an appeal process in a bill designed to allow for a grant of citizenship to foreign adopted children without first requiring that they be permanent residents was quite logical and, as in the case before us today, did not go beyond the scope of the bill. I want to quote your decision, which was very wise:

Having reviewed the bill as reported to the House, I cannot conclude that an amendment which provides for an appeal of a decision by the minister is contrary to the principle of the bill. As I see it, such an amendment places a condition on how decisions of the minister are exercised, but the principle of the bill remains intact. In the view of the Chair then, the amendment is admissible in that respect.

The purpose of Bill C-257 is to prohibit employers under the Canada Labour Code from hiring replacement workers to perform the duties of employees who are on strike or locked out.

The bill also provides for the imposition of a fine for an offence. In this particular case and in the original version of clause 2.3, which set out some exceptions for protection of property, specifically in cases of labour disputes, I do not see how stipulating situations where the new conditions should be relaxed could be considered going beyond the scope of the bill. These are additional clarifications, exactly as you ruled in the case I mentioned previously.

The Leader of the Government in the House of Commons initially said that we could not amend Bill C-257 by making reference to section 87.4, claiming that this section was not in the original bill. This is not true. In the original bill, we referred to section 87.4 in clause 2.1. I suggest that he reread the original bill. The argument by the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons therefore simply does not hold up, because it is based on a falsehood.

In fact, this first amendment clarifies how section 87.4 is affected. Since the initial bill mentions subsection 94(2.1) and section 87.4 of the Code, this amendment merely clarifies how these two provisions relate to one another. It is very easy to understand.

Let us now move on to the clauses that posed problems in committee.

Bill C-257 amends certain sections of the Canada Labour Code, including section 87.6, subsection 94(2) and section 100. A reference to section 87.4 also appears in clause 2.1, as I was saying earlier.

Bill C-257 amends subsection 94(2.1) of the Canada Labour Code to include additional prohibitions against employers using replacement workers during labour disputes.

By adding a reference to section 87.4 of the Code—the section that covers the maintenance of activities during a strike or lockout—we are specifying that maintaining certain activities is sometimes essential to public health and safety, even during serious labour conflicts.

Section 87.4 of the Canada Labour Code is known as the essential services section. Integrating this concept illustrates that we recognize the risks a labour conflict may entail.

In fact, as I was saying yesterday, the amendments introduced in committee do not go beyond the scope of the bill. On the contrary, they reduce its impact and have the same effect on the replacement workers bill as the board of referees has on the Immigration Act, a situation you considered acceptable.

This provides further clarification. To say that it is impossible to introduce amendments that limit the application of a bill, that define and clarify it, would be to say that all committee work is totally useless because it cannot change the application of any bill being studied anyway.

The main argument is, I repeat: how can anyone claim that these amendments go beyond the scope of a bill when the purpose of these amendments is, in fact, to limit its scope? These amendments fall within the framework of the bill; they do not allow the boundaries of the bill to be overstepped. All these amendments do is limit the application of this law.

In my opinion, given these additional arguments and the wisdom you showed in the decision I quoted earlier, Bill C-14, if you apply the same principles and the same logic, which is always unshakeable in your case, Mr. Speaker, you will find you must tell the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons to redo his homework.

Opposition Motion—Citizenship and Immigration

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, as Minister of Citizenship and Immigration I am proud to rise today to discuss our government's record on citizenship and immigration.

This debate is my first opportunity to address the House as Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

While I am proud of our government's record, I am quite frankly surprised that the Liberal critic has chosen to give us an opportunity to highlight his own party's dismal record on these issues, especially since his party has one of the worst records on immigration in Canadian history.

Let us just take a look at the Liberal legacy on immigration. The LIberals imposed a $975 head tax on immigrants. They promised to cut it and then did not. They allowed the application backlog, that is, people who want to come to Canada, to grow from 50,000 to the staggering number of 800,000 people. The Liberals froze settlement funding for new immigration for over a decade and then had the audacity to vote against us providing $307 million in new settlement funding for newcomers to our great country.

That is right. The Liberals voted against funding that will help new immigrants learn to read and write in one of Canada's official languages. They voted against providing new immigrants with funding that will assist them to integrate and become productive members of Canadian society.

To sum up the Liberal legacy on immigration, the deputy leader of the Liberal Party himself said, “I have to admit...that we didn't get it done on immigration”. I hate to admit this, but for once I have to agree with the hon. member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore.

The deputy leader of the Liberal Party is not the only Liberal who has been critical of the Liberal record, but here is what the Liberal member for Etobicoke Centre had to say about his party's neglect of the immigration system:

I'm almost reaching the point where I believe that our whole immigration system has become dysfunctional. That in fact it's at the point of being broken.

He said this on CBC, according to CBC.ca, on September 14, 2004.

These are not Conservative criticisms of the Liberals. They are actually from Liberals criticizing the Liberal record on immigration.

While the Liberals stood idly by for 13 long years, we, Canada's new government, are taking real action to address the needs of immigrants. We have cut the permanent resident fee in half, from $975 to $490, because we want to reduce the barriers to newcomers so they can have a good head start for their new lives in Canada.

We are providing $307 million in additional settlement funding to new immigrants, funding that is critical to help newcomers adapt and integrate into the Canadian way of life, funding that is vital to enhancing the lives of people who are new to Canada.

We are committed to establishing an office that would help qualified foreign trained professionals understand what they need and the paths they must follow to become accredited so they can practise in their chosen fields in Canada sooner than ever before.

The 2006 federal budget set aside $18 million over two years to take the first steps toward establishing this entity. Advantage Canada reaffirmed that the government will do more and move forward on this commitment. Improved labour market integration is critical so that Canada can continue attracting and retaining the skilled immigrants that we need.

All levels of government have a role to play in integrating immigrants into Canadian society and into the economy. My colleague, the Minister of Human Resources and Social Development, and I are engaging our partners as we move forward, including provinces, territories, the 440 regulatory bodies, each of which is provincially or territorially regulated, post-secondary institutions, sector councils and employers right across this country. We look forward to making future announcements about our progress in the coming weeks.

We are making it easier for international students to stay in Canada and work off campus. In this regard, we have granted over 11,000 off campus work permits to international students. These students are young, they are motivated and they have a good feel for our country. Why not give them some Canadian work experience and do our best to have them stay after their student visas have expired to use their new skills and knowledge in our country?

We have set the highest target for immigration in 12 years. We are processing a record number of temporary foreign worker applications. In fact, just last year we took in over 100,000 temporary foreign workers. We have opened new temporary foreign worker units in Calgary and Vancouver to better serve those high demand areas. We have created regional lists of jobs where there are clearly identified worker shortages. We have made it faster and simpler for employers to hire a foreign worker for an occupation that is on one of those lists.

We welcomed some 32,000 refugees in the last year. I was at an event in London just a short time ago to announce that Canada will be accepting an additional 2,000 Karen refugees. This is further to the 800 we announced last summer.

We have also issued over 8,900 permanent resident permits based on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

We have introduced legislation, Bill C-14, to make it easier for foreign-born children adopted by Canadian parents to become Canadian citizens once the adoption is finalized.

After years and years of Liberal neglect, we are getting things done for immigrants and for all Canadians.

With respect to citizenship, Liberal hypocrisy knows no bounds. Just this week, they attempted to blame our government for 13 long years of their former government's inaction on the Citizenship Act. They had the audacity to suggest that if only they had been left in power they would have passed a new citizenship act.

I will remind members of this House that it was the Liberal Party that chose to call an early election. In fact, there were several of them. Not one but three citizenship acts died as a result of that. If the Liberals were truly serious about amending the Citizenship Act, they could have done it. After all, they had 13 years, six ministers, four mandates, and three majority governments to do so, and they chose not to.

For the Liberals to claim the moral high ground on this issue of citizenship when they did absolutely nothing for 13 years is, once again, the height of hypocrisy.

I will remind members opposite that while the Liberals were in power it was the Conservative Party that introduced Bill S-2, the only citizenship legislation to receive royal assent.

The Liberals can fearmonger all they want with respect to Canadians losing their citizenship, but as I said earlier this week at committee, some context is desperately needed with respect to the current situation.

Recently, the media have reported on a number of people who have been affected by the loss of Canadian citizenship.

Let me be clear. This problem and those who are affected by it has been taken very seriously by myself as minister and by the government. I have directed my department to deploy whatever resources are necessary to look after the individuals affected. However, while the problem is real and deserves immediate attention, there is little evidence to suggest that it is as massive as it has been reported in the media or portrayed by some members opposite. These reports have mentioned thousands, hundreds of thousands and even possibly over a million people being affected.

To repeat my comments from earlier this week to put things in perspective, we are talking about approximately 450 individuals whose cases have come to our attention and who merit further consideration. Now despite all the attention on this issue, that number has not grown significantly lately. In fact, many of the calls that we have received have been about Canadians who have simply lost their documents. These Canadians have not lost their citizenship. They have lost their proof of citizenship and have needed to replace it, much the same way as anyone who loses a birth certificate has to apply to replace it.

I understand that this may be a frustrating step for someone who needs that proof to apply for a passport, for example, but in this age of heightened security concerns, it is important that we take steps to verify identity and check for potential fraudulent applications.

To address this issue in the short term, my focus is on the 450 cases. This includes people who, by law, had to take steps to retain their citizenship but did not do so, people who never became citizens and people who could have registered as citizens but did not.

For the interest of all concerned, I will outline some of the actions that I have recently taken to address the issues discussed since becoming minister last month.

As I mentioned earlier, I am using the powers available to me as minister under the Citizenship Act and moving to resolve cases just as quickly as possible. I have recently obtained approval through the governor in council for a special grant of citizenship for 33 of the affected individuals. With respect to the outstanding cases, I have made it a priority for my department to review each case on an individual basis. We have assigned additional staff and created a dedicated unit in our call centre for people with questions about their citizenship. Where appropriate, a program officer is being assigned to each case individually.

We are working with our partners to ensure that, while cases are under review, nobody is removed from the country and benefits such as health care and old age security are continued for those individuals. We are working with the Passport Office to refer people to our call centre to speak directly with our citizenship agents.

Finally, we are helping to expedite the process for people who have not lost their citizenship, but rather have lost the proof of their citizenship and need to apply to replace it.

We did not cause this problem. It arises out of the 1947 and 1977 acts, but we will fix it in the short term and the long term for the benefit of all Canadians.

To give additional context, up until the end of last week, we received 692 calls on our dedicated line. These calls were about the possible loss of citizenship. Of the 692 calls, in 675 of those cases their citizenship has been confirmed and no further action is required. Of the remaining 17, 7 have been invited to apply for a discretionary grant of citizenship, another 3 have been identified as permanent residents and have been asked to apply for a regular grant of citizenship, 2 more have been asked to apply for permanent residence and 5 require further examination. That is out of 692. That is a far cry from the hundreds of thousands, indeed, the millions of cases that we have been hearing about in public as well as in the House.

In the longer term, to address the issues, I am open to considering appropriate amendments to the Citizenship Act. That said, my immediate focus is on helping people caught up in this situation right now.

Legislative change could take quite some time. I believe that affected individuals should not have to wait infinitely for the Citizenship Act to be amended and passed. They should be helped right now.

I look forward to the standing committee's recommendations and to hearing from the various witnesses who will be presenting on this subject over the next few weeks. It is my hope that these hearings will provide viable options for consideration in looking at the most effective ways to address these issues over the long term.

I would like to say to all those involved that I will carefully examine all the options, legislative or not, so that we can create a system that is fair for everyone.

Our new government is getting things done on citizenship and immigration. To paraphrase the deputy leader of the Liberal Party, the Liberals just did not get it done.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

At the moment, I don't have any plans to table a whole new citizenship act. As I explained earlier, we set our priority on Bill C-14. However, I have indicated that when it comes to a long-term solution for the citizenship anomalies, I'm willing to consider a wide range of solutions. They could be administrative, regulatory, or legislative. If it's legislative, then I'm seeking your input. Actually, I'm seeking your input whatever the solutions are that you come up with.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

What about these issues that I just raised? The IRB appointment review process; the dual citizenship review process; the Bill C-14, which is supposed to be a priority--you just said it's a priority--and the foreign credentials issue, which has been announced. The creation of the agency was announced earlier in 2006, but as far as we know, nothing has happened yet.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Okay. You'r bringing up an interesting point. I want to note a pattern that we're seeing here. We're seeing that there's an IRB appointment review process on the go. There is a dual citizenship review process as we understand it. There's Bill C-14. There's the foreign credentials issue that we still haven't seen any progress on. So it looks as though there's a lot of inertia or lack of political will. None of these things has moved forward. It appears to us that none of them has moved forward.

I'm just curious: is this a pattern? What is going on? Why is there a lot of foot-dragging?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

We had a couple of choices to make. We could go ahead with a complete review of the Citizenship Act and replace it, or go with Bill C-14. We chose to go ahead with Bill C-14 as a priority.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Okay.

I wanted to ask another question, Minister, about another citizenship issue that we dealt with here at this committee, Bill C-14, on extending citizenship immediately to children adopted by Canadians abroad.

The committee has done its work on that and sent it back to the House, but it hasn't come back to the House for further debate. I'm wondering if there's some problem with the legislation. What's the delay in actually moving on something that everybody at this table thinks is very important legislation?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

With respect to citizenship issues, I would simply say that we moved forward on Bill S-2 when we were in opposition. There is a pathway now to citizenship for the children of Canadians who moved out of the country. There is a pathway for that now, because of a Conservative initiative, Bill S-2. We are moving forward with Bill C-14. We're trying to get that through and make changes so that Canadian parents of foreign-born children can have their children get citizenship more quickly.

So we are making changes, and we'd like to make other changes in the future, but we don't need to reinvent the act just to do that.

Citizenship Act--Bill C-14--Speaker's Ruling

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I am now prepared to rule on the point of order raised by the hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration on October 6 concerning the admissibility of an amendment to Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption), adopted by the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

I would like to thank the Parliamentary Secretary for having raised this issue as well as the hon. members for Burnaby—Douglas and Vaudreuil-Soulanges for having made submissions on this matter.

In his presentation, the parliamentary secretary asserted that an amendment to Bill C-14 adopted by the standing committee was inadmissible for three reasons: it was contrary to the principle of the bill, it was incomplete and it infringed on the financial initiative of the Crown. The hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas presented arguments to the contrary.

To summarize the situation briefly, at its meeting of June 21, 2006, the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration adopted an amendment which reads as follows:

Any decision of the Minister under this section may be appealed to the Immigration Appeal Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board.

That amendment was ruled admissible by the chair of the committee after a point of order was raised by the parliamentary secretary in committee. The ruling was then appealed and sustained. Following further consideration of the bill, the committee reported it to the House on October 2, 2006.

As all hon. members know, the Chair has always been extremely reluctant to be drawn into procedural arguments over committee proceedings since to do so would reopen matters which are properly left to committees themselves to resolve. Perhaps more significantly, such a practice would also undoubtedly tie up the time of the House in reviews of committee decisions defeating the very purpose of committees.

The one exception to this practice is, however, the one cited by the parliamentary secretary in relation to legislation before the House. As he has indicated, House of Commons Procedure and Practice, at pages 661 and 662, indicates that the Chair will become involved if the question at issue is whether a committee has exceeded its powers in its clause by clause review of a bill.

As Speaker Fraser indicated in a ruling found at page 9801 of the Debates for April 28, 1992:

When a bill is referred to a standing or legislative committee of the House, that committee is only empowered to adopt, amend or negative the clauses found in that piece of legislation and to report the bill to the House with or without amendments. The committee is restricted in its examination in a number of ways. It cannot infringe on the financial initiative of the Crown, it cannot go beyond the scope of the bill as passed at second reading, and it cannot reach back to the parent act to make further amendments not contemplated in the bill no matter how tempting this may be.

The first issue raised by the parliamentary secretary in his presentation to the House relates to the amendment being contrary to the principle of the bill. As the parliamentary secretary himself stated at page 3769 of the Debates:

The principle of Bill C-14, as adopted by the House, was to allow for a grant of citizenship to foreign adopted children without first requiring them to be permanent residents.

Having reviewed the bill as reported to the House, I cannot conclude that an amendment which provides for an appeal of a decision by the minister is contrary to the principle of the bill. As I see it, such an amendment places a condition on how decisions of the minister are exercised, but the principle of the bill remains intact. In the view of the Chair then, the amendment is admissible in that respect.

The next issue relates to the amendment being incomplete. As House of Commons Procedure and Practice explains at page 656:

—an amendment is out of order if it refers to, or is not intelligible without, subsequent amendments or schedules of which notice has not been given, or if it is incomplete.

Here again, in reviewing the bill, as reported to the House, I have not found any difficulty. As I read it, the amendment is intelligible, grammatical and complete as to the course of action that it is proposing. I cannot concur with the parliamentary secretary.

In his third and final argument, the parliamentary secretary claims that the amendment creates a new and distinct purpose for the Immigration and Refugee Board beyond its existing legal mandate under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and that this infringes on the financial initiative of the Crown. The member for Burnaby—Douglas disputes this conclusion, arguing that no expansion of the mandate is contemplated.

The Chair has noted that Bill C-14 proposes no amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. Nor does the disputed amendment propose modifications to that act. As I read it, the amendment only provides that decisions arrived at under the terms of Bill C-14 may be appealed to the IRB's Immigration Appeal Division. Although immigration and citizenship issues are inextricably inclined, Bill C-14 deals solely with the issue of foreign adopted children and not with the mandate of the Immigration and Refugee Appeal Board. In effect, the Chair must limit itself to the bill currently before the House and cannot delve into the provisions of acts not addressed in the bill. The same principles apply to the amendment.

The Chair has concluded that the amendment adopted by the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration has respected the rules of admissibility. It may be that the amendment to the bill will require other legislative actions in order to be fully implemented, but that is a legal question and not a procedural one. The Chair is limited to the narrow confines of Bill C-14 and must conclude that, standing alone, the amendment does not create a new and distinct purpose. Nor does it authorize the expenditure of public funds for a new or distinct purpose.

In summary, then, I find that the bill, as reported to the House, is procedurally in order. Of course, the House may choose to revisit the particular amendment that gave rise to the point of order raised by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, using the appropriate mechanisms provided for under the report stage rules.

The Chair wishes to thank the House for its patience in dealing with this rather unusual situation.

Citizenship Act--Bill C-14

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I, perhaps, have a somewhat tamer point of order which is in response to a previous point raised. I want to clarify the facts referred to in the comments made by the member for Burnaby—Douglas on Tuesday, October 17, when responding to the point of order I raised in respect to Bill C-14.

Before making a ruling, I believe it is important to note that the member was incorrect when he asserted that the denial of citizenship to an adopted child was a de facto denial of an immigration visa and permanent residence status. The member made this argument to persuade you, Mr. Speaker, that there was no difference between citizenship and immigration matters so that you would conclude that the immigration appeal division of the Immigration and Refugee Board may hear citizenship matters.

The fact is that citizenship and permanent residency each have a very different status in law. Indeed, so substantial are the differences that each is defined in separate statutes, as are the procedures and applications relevant to them.

Mr. Speaker, the member would have you overlook the fact that there is nothing in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that provides the Immigration and Refugee Board with powers or a mandate to deal with citizenship. The procedures and process for citizenship are limited to the Citizenship Act. None of those procedures or processes refer to or relate to the IRB.

More fundamental to the argument by the member for Burnaby—Douglas is his incorrect assertion that one can look past the lack of a citizenship mandate of the IRB by finding that citizenship decisions have an impact on the applicant's visa or permanent residence status application. The member, simply put, was wrong.

The fact is that denial of citizenship has little impact on permanent residence status. It is certainly incorrect to say that a denial of citizenship is a de facto denial of permanent residence. Under the current law it is possible for a permanent resident to apply for citizenship and be denied with the denial having no effect on his or her permanent residence status.

The second significant error to the member's submission that I wish to clarify is his suggestion that the incompleteness of the amendments may be addressed by regulations to Bill C-14 by stating:

...that requirements as to its operation can be delineated in regulations developed to implement the act, and therefore the amendment meets all the tests of completeness.

The member made this argument hoping to persuade you, Mr. Speaker, to overlook the fact that the legislation that creates the Immigration and Refugee Board does not already recognize citizenship or a role for itself in dealing with citizenship matters.

The member's submission that a new role for the IRB can be delineated in regulations to Bill C-14 is incorrect. I gave my remarks on October 6 on the inadmissibility of an amendment that requires subsequent amendment of an act that was not before the committee. I do not propose to repeat those comments here but to simply respond to the member for Burnaby—Douglas' contention and clarify that there are no provisions in the Citizenship Act or the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that would permit the making of regulations that would change the existing mandate of the immigration appeal division.

If his submission is to be taken as being that the regulations to Bill C-14 can speak to the mandate and powers of the immigration appeal division and broaden them to allow the immigration appeal division to deal with a citizenship matter, then I would refer to my previous comments on October 6 only to add that regulations to an amendment of the statute may not amend another statute that was not before the committee.

In this instance, regulations to an amendment to the Citizenship Act may not amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act which creates the mandate and powers of the immigration appeal division.

With respect to the royal proclamation, the argument essentially was that since there would no longer be appeals under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, somehow these funds could be applied to appeals under the Citizenship Act, is somewhat circular in the sense that if there is no appeal provision in respect to the adoption provision in the Adoption Act, moneys would be saved and in order for the appeal to happen we would require additional funding which would require a royal proclamation. For that reason, also, it would not be acceptable.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to respond to the point of order raised on Friday, October 6 by the parliamentary secretary, regarding Bill C-14. I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the concerns raised by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration in the House on Friday October 6 regarding the admissibility of an amendment to Bill C-14 that was passed when the bill was under consideration in the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

As the mover of that amendment at the standing committee, I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the point of order. As we know, the amendment in question adds a new subsection to clause 2 of Bill C-14, which reads:

Any decision of the Minister under this section may be appealed to the Immigration Appeal Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board.

I would first point out that this amendment was found by the chair of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration to be in order, and it was discussed and debated by the committee and approved by a majority of members of the committee in that context.

I would like to emphasize that the parliamentary secretary made his arguments before the committee at that time.

As well, there was a vote at the committee, after hearing the arguments made by the parliamentary secretary and after hearing from other members, upholding the chair's ruling that the amendment was in order. The committee voted to sustain the chair's ruling.

I appreciate that the committee's actions do not preclude an approach to the Speaker and the House on this issue, but I want it to be clear for the Speaker that these issues were considered by the committee. I know that the Speaker has repeatedly found that in most cases committees know best when dealing with the matters before them, so I thought the fact that this amendment was debated and found in order by the committee is important.

I submit that the amendment does not go beyond the scope of the bill as passed by the House at second reading. Bill C-14 and the amendment in question are amendments to section 5 of the Citizenship Act. Section 5 deals with the question of grants of citizenship and sets out the minister's obligation with regard to the granting of citizenship. It also grants discretionary powers to the minister to waive requirements of the act in certain cases.

Bill C-14 amends this section of the act by adding a new section 5.1 that addresses the citizenship of children adopted by Canadians overseas, granting them citizenship upon application at the time of the finalization of adoption. This removes the discriminatory effects of the current law, which requires adopted children to apply for permanent resident status and then meet the residency requirements before subsequently applying for Canadian citizenship, but grants children born to Canadians overseas immediate Canadian citizenship without such an application.

Section 5 currently establishes criteria for obtaining Canadian citizenship, as well as noting situations where the minister may exercise discretion. Bill C-14 proposes a new section 5.1, which adds new criteria when dealing with children adopted overseas by Canadians. The amendment proposed by the standing committee to Bill C-14, rather than stepping outside the scope of the bill passed at second reading, merely adds a further consideration to the decision making powers of the minister as outlined in sections 5 and 5.1 by allowing an appeal of the minister's decision. I submit that this is in keeping with the principle of the bill as passed at second reading.

With regard to the parliamentary secretary's contention that this amendment provides new powers and a new mandate to the Immigration and Refugee Board beyond what is provided in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, I would submit that denial of citizenship to an adopted child is a de facto denial of an immigration visa and permanent resident status to that child and, as such, the Immigration and Refugee Board is exactly the body that exercises judgment and rules on such cases.

The board is the body that understands the issues related to the validity of adoptions of children by Canadians overseas by currently ruling on appeals of the denial of permanent resident status to children adopted overseas. I would maintain that the issues investigated and criteria applied currently to rule on an appeal of permanent resident status to a child adopted by a Canadian overseas will be the same issues and criteria used to rule on an appeal of the denial of citizenship to such a child should Bill C-14 and the amendment be passed into law by Parliament.

This does not, therefore, add new powers or a new mandate to the Immigration and Refugee Board beyond those already mandated and exercised. The final result of decisions appealed will change as a result of a decision, given that under Bill C-14, should this amendment carry, an adopted child will become a Canadian citizen instead of a permanent resident, but the decision making process of the appeal is essentially the same.

In this respect, no new powers or mandate are conferred by the amendment, and no royal recommendation would be necessary since no new activities are being contemplated or undertaken. No new public funds should be required in these circumstances and therefore I would argue that it does not impinge on the financial initiative of the Crown.

Mr. Speaker, this amendment was presented and its procedural admissibility was approved by the committee. In your ruling on the form and content of report stage amendments, made on March 21, 2001, you implored members to use every possible opportunity at committee to make amendments and therefore save report stage for the purpose it was intended.

Mr. Speaker, you stated:

--I would strongly urge all members and all parties to avail themselves fully of the opportunity to propose amendments during committee stage so that the report stage can return to the purpose for which it was created, namely for the House to consider the committee report and the work the committee has done, and to do such further work as it deems necessary to complete detailed consideration of the bill.

This is exactly what I have been trying to do. The amendment supports both the scope and spirit of the bill, and I contend it achieves the overriding goal the government has stated that the bill is supposed to achieve.

With regard to the contention that this amendment is incomplete, I submit that requirements as to its operation can be delineated in regulations developed to implement the act, and therefore the amendment meets all the tests of completeness. Surely the government is not asking that this House consider that legislation is incomplete unless all regulations are published before report stage. That would fly against all past practices of this place.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for hearing my response to the point of order raised by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. I would urge you to allow this important amendment to stand and be considered by the House.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order in regard to Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption). It is the government's view that an amendment adopted by the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration to add a new clause to the bill should have been found out of order by the chair of the committee. I would ask, Mr. Speaker, that you find that the amendment is indeed out of order.

As Marleau and Montpetit note on page 661-2:

The admissibility of those amendments, and of any other amendments made by a committee, may therefore be challenged on procedural grounds when the House resumes its consideration of the bill at report stage.

The amendment in question added a new subsection to clause 2 of Bill C-14. It reads:

Any decision of the Minister under this section may be appealed to the Immigration Appeal Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board.

This amendment we suggest is inadmissible for three reasons. First, the amendment goes beyond the principle of the bill adopted by this House at second reading. As noted by Marleau and Montpetit at page 645:

If the bill has already received second reading, the committee is bound by the decision of the House and may not amend the bill contrary to its principle.

Speaker Fraser clarified this in a ruling on April 28, 1992. He said:

The committee is restricted in its examination in a number of ways. It cannot infringe on the financial initiative of the Crown, it cannot go beyond the scope of the bill as passed at second reading, and it cannot reach back to the parent act to make further amendments not contemplated in the bill no matter how tempting this may be.

The amendment would provide new powers and a new mandate to the Immigration and Refugee Board beyond what is provided in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act which creates the board and limits the board's role to immigration and refugee matters but would not involve citizenship.

The principle of Bill C-14, as adopted by the House, was to allow for a grant of citizenship to foreign adopted children without first requiring them to be permanent residents. It was not to provide a new role for the Immigration and Refugee Board.

Second, the amendment is incomplete. As Marleau and Montpetit note on page 656:

As well, an amendment is out of order if it refers to, or is not intelligible without, subsequent amendments or schedules of which notice has not been given, or if it is otherwise incomplete.

The Immigration and Refugee Board, to which the amendment proposes appeals be made, operates under the statutory authority of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, not the Citizenship Act.

Even though I believe the amendment to be outside the scope of the bill, the sponsor neglected to include further amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that are necessary to make this amendment intelligible and operational, perhaps in attempting to move an amendment that would not be seen to be out of order on those grounds.

The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act does not provide for, and the amendment does not address, providing the Immigration and Refugee Board with the power to hear citizenship appeals, establishing potential grounds for appeals, specifying the relationship between appeals to the board and existing rights to judicial review, providing the board with the power to rule on the appeal, for example, by granting citizenship which the amendment's reference to an appeal process is meaningless.

These critical authorities are established in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act for other types of appeals heard by the board and its divisions. Similar legislative provisions would be required for the board to identify its mandate and be able to make orders to resolve appeals of a citizenship decision.

Third and finally, the reason this amendment is out of order is that it requires a royal recommendation. On May 9, 2005 the Acting Speaker ruled that a new purpose for an existing appropriation requires a royal recommendation: He stated:

The royal recommendation is also required where a bill alters the appropriation of public revenue “under the circumstances, in the manner and for the purposes set out” in the bill.

What this means is that the royal recommendation is not only required in the case where more money is being appropriated, but also in a case where the authorization to spend for a specific purpose is being significantly altered. Furthermore, on February 8, 2005, the Chair ruled:

Where it is clear that the legislative objective of a bill cannot be accomplished without the dedication of public funds to that objective, the bill must be seen as the equivalent of a bill effecting an appropriation.

The same principle applies to amendments. Since the board does not currently deal with citizenship decisions, any existing royal recommendation for the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act could not possibly cover this new purpose.

Moreover, the addition of a new type of appeal hearing could not be implemented without additional public funds, for example, for more board members to hear cases of new policy and administrative resources to support these hearings. The amendment, therefore, requires a royal recommendation.

Given those three reasons, I submit that the amendment is out of order.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Norman Doyle, Conservative, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the fifth report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration on Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption), with amendments.

I have the honour as well to present, in both official languages, the sixth report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration entitled “Stateless Vietnamese Refugees in the Philippines”.

Finally, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the seventh report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration entitled “Audit of the Canadian Security Intelligence Services Immigration Services”.

[Meili Faille, Bloc, Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I would like to move that the committee issue a press release stating that Bill C-14 has been approved with amendments.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Now we will go to the confusing part of the bill. We've had a number of amendments, and some of these amendments have now been withdrawn. We're proceeding with some new ones, and I think you have copies. You have a package that contains the amendments, but I'm told that's not accurate on 11.1. Since then the parliamentary secretary has distributed Madame Faille's two amendments. Pull BQ-4.1 and BQ-5.1 out of the package; they're not relevant any more. We have the new ones.

“That Bill C-14 be amended by adding after line 31 on page 2 the following new clause”--this is what Madame Faille has submitted. Has everyone got that one, for 3.1?

I believe the copy you have is that the act is amended by adding the following after section 27:

The Minister shall cause a copy of each regulation proposed to be made under paragraph 27(d.1) to be laid before each House of Parliament, and each House shall refer the proposed regulation to the appropriate Committee of that House.

Are you going to move the amendment, Madame Faille?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Okay, we're going to get going. I think we have a quorum and then some.

I want to welcome to our committee this morning officials from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration: Mark Davidson, director; Alain Laurencelle, counsel; and Karen Clarke, acting manager. Thank you for coming, and welcome to the committee.

We're going to try to plow our way through the rest of Bill C-14. I guess we'll begin logically where we left off, which was at clause 3. There were no amendments to clause 3, so I think that one was fairly straightforward.

(Clause 3 agreed to)

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you.

We have only ten minutes or so. It's too bad there is a committee waiting to come here to begin their committee meeting, because generally we can go a little bit over in our committee meetings.

We do have the second report of the subcommittee on agenda and procedure. We had our subcommittee meeting about a week ago, and I believe all of you have a copy of the agenda. I want to indicate to you that this agenda is not written in stone. You can amend it if you wish to and talk about it a little bit.

Normally this is an important issue. I would postpone it until Thursday, but the clerk has indicated to me that it's necessary to deal with some of it, given the fact that he has to contact witnesses to come here.

So I present to you the second report of the subcommittee on agenda and procedure. We're down to Thursday, September 28. We will talk about Bill C-14 at that time. But let's talk about the parts from Thursday up until October 26. Do we have any comments from anyone on the agenda?

Jim, go ahead, please.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Citizenship Act

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

moved that Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I am grateful for the opportunity to open the debate today on Bill C-14.

As members may know, this bill was introduced in the House on May 15. The timing was no accident. The United Nations designated May 15 as International Families Day. This is a day to reflect on the importance of families to societies around the world. This year's theme was about changing families and it has given us an opportunity to see how we can support their changing needs.

This bill give us the perfect opportunity to show our support for Canadian families who wish to adopt children born abroad.

Let me tell the House about one of those children. A baby girl was abandoned in a public place in China where she would likely be found. She was only a few months old. An orphanage took her in and gave her a date of birth and a name. She was lucky.

A Canadian woman heard of the little girl and began the adoption process. She went to China and returned with a skinny and frightened little girl who, for the third time in 15 months, had been given to someone she did not know.

After waiting for two years for amendments to the Citizenship Act the Canadian mother arranged for her adopted daughter's case to be channelled through the usual immigration process and she received Canadian citizenship in about one year.

Today, she is a very happy girl living in Scarborough.

However, if this little girl had received citizenship at the time of her adoption, there would have been one less obstacle to be overcome and her adoptive parents would have been saved much time, effort and frustration.

The government has an agenda that is focused on outcomes. We want to see laws that improve the lives of Canadians, its citizens and immigrants. With respect to the immigration part of my portfolio, we have already taken action in a number of ways.

I recently announced that international students in our universities and colleges will be allowed to compete for off campus jobs on a level playing field with their Canadian peers. About 100,000 students across Canada stand to benefit by this opportunity to develop skills, language and experience.

The government is committed to improving the social and economic outcomes that recognize the importance of better supporting immigrants so that they can succeed socially and economically. That is why we are providing two years of additional settlement funding, a total of $307 million in new funding.

To help victims of human trafficking, we moved quickly to implement new measures such as temporary resident permits to help victims come forward and report the crime and begin their recovery.

We are operating according to the plan we introduced.

That plan includes addressing three citizenship and immigration matters, three issues impeding a fairer and more sensible immigration program that works for Canada.

The first was to reduce the right of permanent residence fee by half. That was done in the May 2 budget.

The second was to take steps to establish a Canadian agency for the recognition of foreign credentials. With $18 million provided for in the budget, we can begin to make headway after years of false starts. I fully support my colleague on this project, the Minister of Human Resources and Social Development, who will continue to consult with the provinces and territories regarding this agency. We will await her advice and proceed accordingly.

The third of course was to support Canadian parents who adopt foreign-born children, and here is the legislation. The legislation springs from a Conservative Party of Canada policy position that was adopted in early 2005. The idea won the favour of all parties by the end of that year.

This legislation is a thoughtful and balanced response to issues raised about our current law. It is also an expression of Conservative and Canadian values. We have also heard from important stakeholders such as the Adoption Council of Canada. They are behind the bill. So are the many other families who have their own stories of frustration and delays. I can recall countless stories where people were concerned about the time and effort required to get Canadian citizenship for their adopted foreign-born children. Their input and concerns are reflected in the continuing work that goes into the regulations that will complete this legislation.

Families and representatives of families have all been calling for our government to modify its legislation to support families, to get it done. This legislation does get it done. It gets it done for families and it gets it done for children. We are there to support families. By passing this legislation, members of this House will be doing not only what is right, they will be increasing fairness in Canadian citizenship legislation.

The issues dealt with in this legislation have been noted for some time. They were examined by standing committees during previous sessions of Parliament. This bill benefits from what was put before those committees. The discussions leading up to the present bill have been long and deliberate. They have also been pragmatic and democratic. Individuals who have real life experience with the requirements of current legislation came forward. We sat down with them and listened to their frustrations about the status quo.

I would like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the hon. member for Prince George--Peace River who took a leading role in these discussions. In fact I will say that over the last many years, I do not know of a single parliamentarian who has played more of a leadership role on the issue of adoption than that member. At a time when really no other parliamentarians were coming forward on this issue, the member for Prince George--Peace River, the government whip, was there standing up for families who were struggling with all kinds of adoption issues, including the issue of providing citizenship to foreign-born children. Today we see the fruits of all of his labour up until this point.

We also consulted widely on what could and should be done. The result is in this bill. It is a sensible and coherent response to issues raised around Canadian citizenship for foreign-born children and young people adopted by Canadians. It delivers a major priority of our election platform: a fair and sensible citizenship and immigration system that works for Canada.

Currently, Canadian citizens residing in Canada who wish to adopt a foreign-born child abroad must first sponsor the child as a permanent resident. Only after that step has been taken can an application be made for citizenship. With this bill we are making it easier for Canadian parents to obtain Canadian citizenship for their foreign-born adopted children, whether the parents reside in Canada or abroad.

Today's bill is good news.

Bill C-14 gives children adopted overseas access to citizenship without having first to apply for permanent residence. It reduces delays in getting citizenship for children who are becoming part of Canadian families. It is an expression of our desire as Canadians to see new families constituted as supportively and as quickly as possible.

This bill will mean more fairness.

At present there is a difference in the way we treat children adopted overseas by Canadians and those who are born overseas to Canadians. A child born to Canadians overseas receives Canadian citizenship by birth. An adopted child must first get permanent residence before citizenship. The families who have opened their hearts to these children certainly do not make that distinction and neither do we.

This legislation streamlines the process for families. It augments the fairness of our system as a whole. It has the support of Canadians across the country. That is because we listened carefully to any concerns raised in our consultations, concerns for example about the possibility of individuals adopting children merely to help them acquire citizenship, adoptions of convenience as they are known. We crafted the bill to deal specifically and coherently with these concerns.

Among other safeguards, Bill C-14 ensures that the existence of a genuine parent-child relationship is demonstrated, that the best interests of the child are being met, that a proper home assessment has been made, that the birth parents have given their consent to the adoption, and that no person will achieve unwarranted gain as a result of the adoption.

I would like to clarify that this bill applies to adoptions that took place after the Citizenship Act came into effect on February 15, 1977.

There is an additional matter I would draw to the attention of the House. This is the case of adoptive parents living in Canada. The province or territory where the parent resides will be an integral part of the adoption process. That is because adoption falls within provincial and territorial jurisdiction. Bill C-14 does nothing to alter this. The government does not wish to impinge in any way upon the prerogatives of the provinces and territories.

I began my remarks by talking about a little girl. Let me close with the story of two parents and their experience. They will soon join 10 other Canadian families to fly to China to bring their newly adopted children back to Canada. Can anyone imagine their flight home. It is their opinion that the current citizenship process “is a difficult and lengthy process, so this”--Bill C-14--“is a big help....This is one less obstacle”. When embarking on the journey of adopting their children, these parents were surprised to discover that citizenship rules are different for babies adopted abroad as compared to babies born to Canadians abroad. Babies are people just starting out with a clean slate.

I conclude by returning to the theme of this year's International Day of Families. It is pertinent to this legislation. It is “Changing Families: Challenges and Opportunities”. With this bill we are doing our part to support families and adopted young people in a time of rapid change globally. Indeed we are supporting families and their newest members, their adopted children, children we want to see protected, children we want to welcome, children who we want to feel at home here in Canada.

Bill C-14 contributes to one of this government's priorities: a fair and sensible immigration program that works for Canada. For these reasons, I look forward to the debate ahead of us. A prominent immigration lawyer has commented on the bill by saying, “This is a win-win situation. No one will object to this piece of legislation. It will pass, I hope, the House very quickly. It will go through committee stages and it will receive royal assent, I hope, very quickly. It is long overdue”.

Indeed, the member for Trinity—Spadina has commented on this. I would think that she concurs with the proposed changes. She is a highly regarded member of the House, but there is a reason for all members to be as proud of this legislation as I am. I look forward to both sides of the House supporting the passage of the provisions of this bill as quickly as possible.

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (adoption).

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)